Red Sun
by Nina542
Summary: Months after Syria, Gabriel and Riley land in Tokyo to join forces with Agent Griffin and stop an assassination attempt on Japan's Prime Minister during the President's Asian tour. Although Griffin's advances on Riley leave Gabriel fuming, all seems well until the mission spins out of control. Now it's a race against the clock to survive the night - and time is running out.
1. The Mission

**A/N: Hello, fandom! The person who introduced me to Intelligence said I would like it because of the complex relationship between Riley and Gabriel. I watched one episode and was hooked. Love those two!**

**Hope you enjoy. **

* * *

**Angel's Bluff, Virginia**  
**Cyber-Command Fitness and Training Room**  
**07:36 EST**

Special Agent Gabriel Vaughn was flat on his back. Stars were swimming before his eyes, and as he dizzily stared up at it, he was fairly certain that the ceiling of the training room hadn't always been that ugly moss green tile.

"Geez…" he groaned, wondering what idiot ever thought sparring on gym mats would soften a fall when you landed head first. "The hell was _that_…?"

The hum and buzz of the large room, the sound of weights clanging, and fellow agents exercising, didn't block out the sound of one snarky male voice. "From where I'm standing, 'that' was you getting your ass kicked."

Scowling, Gabriel rolled his head to the side and spotted Chris Jameson standing a few feet away, arms crossed and smirking at him. Like Gabriel, the neckline of his T-shirt was stained with a dark arc of sweat, and his hair, normally combed and neat, stuck out at odd places. Jameson cocked an eyebrow at his friend, daring a rebuttal.

Gabriel narrowed his eyes. "You can be next, you know."

He knew he had to get up, but the world was still spinning a bit too fast for his liking. Not that Gabriel would ever admit to it. If he did, his partner would worry about the microchip in his brain and haul his ass to the doc's for a day's worth of scans and probes. You didn't mess around when it came to billions of dollars of cutting-edge, top-secret government technology.

Jameson's smirk grew wider. "And end up on my back like you? Think I'll pass, thanks." Turning his attention to someone standing at Gabriel's feet, Jameson waggled his eyebrows. "Nicely done with that take down, by the way. Wouldn't want come up against you in a dark alley."

Following Jameson's gaze, Gabriel looked to find Riley Neal; his partner, protector, and friend watching him with hands on hips. Her lips were pulled up in a triumphant smile. Her long, dark hair was tied back in a ponytail. Her cheeks were flushed from their sparring match, and the low-cut tank-top she wore revealed a chest that glistened from exertion.

Not that Gabriel was looking there.

"Thanks," Riley replied. "Actually haven't used that move since my second day at Secret Service. Good to see I've still got it." She eyed her partner as he continued to lay prone on the mat. "You all right?"

Although her tone was light, Gabriel could tell from the way she kept watching him that Riley was starting to grow concerned over the fact that he hadn't yet gotten back on his feet. "Just peachy," he growled as the room finally stopped spinning.

"Then get up, princess." Her voice was teasing, but layered. Then, as if realizing what would definitely get him moving again, she bent at the waist and raised one perfectly arched brow with a mischievous smile. "Or are three minutes all you can handle?"

As Jameson chuckled at the double entendre, Gabriel made a fast decision: worried or not, Riley was going to get it for that one.

They'd been partners for almost a year now, so she knew Gabriel's strengths and weakness and he could handle Riley kicking his ass. He could also more-or-less handle her calling him a princess. She seemed to delight in that one. But for some reason, and especially since Jin Cong's EMP attack a month ago, the idea of Riley Neal questioning his sexual prowess was not something Gabriel was okay with.

Not that he was about to think of why. Right now, it was time to exact some sweet revenge.

"Oh, I'm plenty ready to handle more," Gabriel breezed, rolling onto his side and propping himself up on his forearm. "The only question is; are _you_?"

Without any other warning, Gabriel snapped his leg around and literally swept Riley off her feet. With a yelp, she crashed onto her back and a moment later Gabriel was straddling her hips and grabbing hold of her wrists to pin them on either side of her head. Immobilized, Riley stared up at Gabriel first in surprise, then with annoyance as she realized he'd managed to catch her so completely off guard.

With a shake of his head and a _tisk-tisk, _Gabriel leaned close and murmured low and teasing; "Guess you weren't."

Their faces now only inches apart, Riley tensed under him and Gabriel's smirk started to fade as he became acutely aware of just how close they were. He could feel the smallest of Riley's movements. He could see the pulse in the curve of her throat. Sense the heat radiating from her cheeks. Count every crease in her full, bottom lip. There she was – trapped so submissively and defencelessly beneath him, and –

"Gabriel…" Riley said in a slow, dangerous voice. "Get off of me."

He blinked. Then blinked again.

Right.

"What, no 'please'?" he quipped, hoping to cut through the air of tension that had thickly descended around them.

If looks could kill, Gabriel would have died letting go of Riley's wrists.

Getting to his feet, he offered her a hand up but his partner was already standing. Standing, and backing away from him. Arms crossed, she stared at the mats while pointedly clearing her throat. There was a tense pause, and when Riley finally met Gabriel's eyes, he saw a mask.

"I think I'll do some weights," she deadpanned.

Ouch.

Just then, the opening theme song from _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_ cut through the air, causing heads to turn. The sound was coming from Riley's cell, left next to her water bottle on the edge of the mats. She had a call.

While his partner walked away to answer her phone, Gabriel suddenly realized that Jameson was still standing off to the side, watching them. Which meant he had witnessed Gabriel and Riley's…whatever the hell it was…in its entirety.

As if on cue, Jameson raised an eyebrow at Gabriel and gave him a knowing look.

Great. That was just great.

The theme music ended when Riley pressed the Talk button. "Neal here." Listening to the speaker on the other end, she picked up her water bottle and took a quick swig. "Okay, we're just in the training room," Riley told the caller. "Be there in twenty." As she disconnected, the serious look on her face read that it was game time. "That was Nelson," Riley explained, darting her eyes between Gabriel and Jameson. "An op just came down the line and we've gotta move on it fast. I'll meet you guys in C-DOC." Waiting only half a second for the two men's nods of understanding, Riley made a hasty retreat towards the change rooms without so much as a backwards glance.

Jameson joined Gabriel on the mats. "Well, that was…" he trailed off in contemplation.

Arms crossed and frowning, Gabriel watched his partner continue her fast getaway. "Awkward as all hell?" he offered. "She's a sore loser."

"Right, because _Riley's _the one with the problem, here." There was a pause before Jameson continued on. "Word of advice?"

"Oh, this should be good…"

Jameson moved so that he was facing Gabriel and set him with a serious look. "Ever since that EMP messed with your head, something's changed between you and Riley. Now, I get that you two are close and maybe that attack made you closer, but trust me; you don't want to fall for her. Not when she's supposed to take bullets for you."

Something painful twisted in Gabriel's chest. "I'm not falling for her."

Snorting a bitter laugh, Jameson clapped a hand on his friend's shoulder. "Sure you're not." Then he retreated to the change rooms, leaving Gabriel to his thoughts.

* * *

**Angel's Bluff, Virginia**  
**Cyber-Command Cyber Defense Operations Center (C-DOC)**  
**08:02 EST**

Cyber-Com Director Lillian Strand walked into a bustling roomful of agents, holding a tablet that controlled the line of screens she headed towards. Searching, she saw Gabriel silently leaning against a computer terminal off to the side, with Riley rigidly standing a step behind him; her hair still wet from a fast shower. Reaching the wall of screens at the front of the room, Lillian spotted Nelson Cassidy to her right, sitting in front of a computer monitor and gesturing to it as Jameson hovered over his shoulder.

The kids were all here.

Lillian swiped a finger over the tablet and a satellite image of Japan popped up behind her. "Listen up, people," she began, bringing eyes up front and all noise to an end. "Less than an hour ago, we intercepted some chatter between two nationals in Tokyo, concerning an assassination planned against Prime Minister Shinzo Abe." She zoomed the satellite image until it focused on an aerial view of Tokyo's Roppongi District, and highlighted one particular building. "Intel's limited at this stage, but it seems that whomever is planning the attack is going to be making their move during a banquet that's being held tomorrow night at the Grand Hyatt hotel," she pointed to the highlighted building, "in honour of President Finnegan's visit to Japan."

The mention of the American president's name caught Gabriel's attention. "Finnegan? What's he doing in the Land of the Rising Sun?"

"It's the first stop on his Asian tour," Riley explained, keeping her eyes on Lillian. "Besides discussing economic and diplomatic issues, the president wants to bring Japan into the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement."

Lillian gave a short nod, glad that _one_ of her agents was keeping up with current events. "Correct. TPP negotiations are set to begin the morning after the banquet."

Nelson raised his hand in question. "So, uh, is the Prime Minister of Japan secretly the grown-up version of Astro Boy or something? Because that's the only reason _I_ wouldn't be cancelling dinner if I knew someone was trying to kill_ me_."

Jameson shot his friend a patronizing look, mouthing the words "_Astro Boy?"_

Lillian pressed a finger to her tablet and the mug shot of a scowling Japanese man appeared on one of the screens. Only his left eye was open. "The Prime Minister wants to proceed because we've been able to identify one of the two nationals as this individual." She gestured to the photo. "Meet Kiyoshi Takayama, also known as the second-in-command for the Yamaguchi clan."

"Yamaguchi?" Riley repeated. "As in the yakuza?" She glanced at Gabriel, looking wary. "The Japanese mafia is behind the assassination?"

"It gets better." Gabriel's eyes were sharp as he stared off into space, using the chip to pull up more information. "Takayama here didn't make it to second-in-command by fetching coffee. Besides losing his right eye in a sword fight, this guy's been implicated in arms deals, extortion, drug dealing, contract killings, and…" he frowned. "…human trafficking."

"Badass…" Nelson whispered in awe.

Riley shot him a scathing look. "There's nothing badass about kidnapping innocent girls and forcing them into prostitution."

"Wait, no, I-I didn't mean that," Nelson stammered. "Just the sword part is - " He caught Gabriel glaring at him and went silent. "Sorry."

Lillian continued on, unfazed. "Prime Minister Abe has had a target on his back ever since he passed some heavy legislation named the Yakuza Exclusionary Laws a few weeks ago. Essentially, these laws make it illegal for civilians to share profits with gang members, or give them money in any way. This includes protection money, blackmail, extortion, racketeering…the list goes on. Needless to say, this has been a big hit to the yakuza; and will cost them millions, if not billions. Killing Abe would send a very big message back to the Cabinet, but he won't back down. The banquet is proceeding as planned because he wants the yakuza to know he isn't afraid of them and will do whatever it takes to break the stranglehold they have on his country."

"Even if letting the dinner happen puts the President of the United States at risk, too," Gabriel added. "Ballsy."

Lillian faced him. "Which is why I'm sending you and Riley to Tokyo. Obviously Takayama knows better than to show up at the banquet himself, so we need you to use the chip and identify anyone at the dinner who could have ties to Takayama or the Yamaguchi clan. It's estimated that there are over 55,000 members, and since we haven't been able to ID the man Takayama was speaking to, any number of them could be part of this plot. And unfortunately, we don't have any intel on how they're planning to execute it."

"Oh, so no pressure, or anything," Gabriel said sardonically. "That's a relief."

Despite the severity of the situation, Lillian allowed herself a small smile at his quip. "Once you land in Tokyo, you'll liaison with Japan's National Guard and of course the Secret Service for the op, and go from there."

As Lillian expected, all eyes went to Riley. After the mission in Syria, everyone had found out about her past relationship with Secret Service Agent Charlie Griffin, and how he had went behind Riley's back to snag the promotion of Detail Leader.

Gabriel flashed his partner a teasing smile which Lillian noticed didn't fully reach his eyes. "Here that, Riley? We get to work with your favourite person again."

"Great." Riley's tone was flat, but Lillian saw something in her expression that suggested she might be more accepting of the idea than not.

Interesting.

The Director glanced at her watch then faced the room. "We're under a crunch here, people, so let's move." As agents jumped into action, Lillian caught Gabriel's eye, knowing she had to set the record straight on one particular item. "Gabriel, I'd like a word?"

He joined her at the front of the room. "Going to ask me to bring home some sushi for you?"

Lillian fixed him with a no-nonsense look and cut straight to the chase. "I read Agent Griffin's post-op report from Syria. He called you a -"

" – 'loose cannon with a cowboy complex'?" Gabriel quoted, flashing a mischievous smile and tapping at his head. "I read it, too."

That wasn't a surprise.

"And you called him a 'whining pansy who couldn't aim'."

He shrugged casually. "I thought that summed it up pretty well." Glancing back at his partner, Gabriel added; "I'm sure Riley would agree."

Lillian cocked an eyebrow at him, sensing tension ahead. "Play nice, children. That's an order."


	2. Thriller

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Grand Hyatt Tokyo, Lobby  
16:08 JST**

Riley decided the minute she rolled her suitcase through the sliding doors of the hotel lobby that there was in fact a fourth thing the Japanese could to well other than food, technology, and wide-eyed cartoon characters: chic elegance.

Walking a few slow paces into the vast space, she couldn't help but stop and take it all in; from the beige and black speckled marble floors and cubed chocolate brown waiting chairs, to the nine foot tall abstract paintings, and the long and curving mahogany reception desk dotted with attentive, smartly dressed staff. As the staff bowed and called out to her in greeting, Riley noticed that they stood in front of a floor to ceiling wall of softly glowing panes which immediately reminded her of Japan's iconic sliding shoji doors.

There was a sound of rolling wheels and Gabriel gave a low whistle of appreciation just behind her. "Swanky."

Riley nodded in agreement but knew they couldn't stand there for long. There was still a lot of mission prep to get through before the op was live.

Although she had taken advantage of the sixteen hour flight by reviewing the staff and guest list, memorizing data like hotel specs, exit points, and camera locations, as well as running through potential scenarios, Riley knew it didn't really compare to actually being in the building and seeing things for herself. Luckily, due to the Secret Service running all day sweeps of the hotel's twenty-one floors, which included its 387 rooms and suites, seven restaurants, and thirteen meeting rooms, Riley and Gabriel could concentrate their efforts where it was needed most. Specifically, Riley wanted to check out the Grand Ballroom on the third floor; where the banquet would take place and the assassination was most likely to be attempted. Now that they had arrived at the hotel and passed their SUV over to a white-gloved valet, the next thing to do was go to their room and set up the tech they brought for a quick check-in with CDOC. After that, a thorough sweep of the third floor could begin. Riley wanted to familiarize herself with every inch of it before it was time to dress for the banquet and meet the Prime Minister. He, along with his National Guard, was due to arrive in the hotel's underground parking lot at 5:45, and they would escort the Prime Minister up a service elevator for a 6:00 grand entrance, which would signal the start of cocktails. That was less than two hours away, so there was no time to waste.

Gabriel seemed to be thinking the same thing. "Come on," he said, with a nod towards the reception desk. "Let's go find out how much Uncle Sam sprung for our room this time."

As they rolled their suitcases over, Riley looked up to spot a couple of cameras along the ceiling. "How's our security looking?" she asked her partner.

Gabriel already had that focused-unfocused look in his eyes. "I'm in them now," he replied. "Just like we thought from the specs - tons of coverage from every angle. Especially in the Grand Ballroom."

"Good. Hopefully that'll make this easy." Taking up a large part of the third floor, the Grand Ballroom was essentially a huge, rectangular room, capable of holding up to 1,200 people in a theatre set-up. For the banquet, the space required for tables still left room for almost 600 guests, and lots of places for an assassin to hide. "I'll still want to do a full sweep of the floor, though."

Gabriel gave her a wounded look, like she didn't believe his super-human camera peeping abilities. "Where's the trust, partner?" he teased.

Riley smirked in return. Gabriel knew full well that she, like the rest of the world, lacked the advantage of a billion dollar microchip in her brain. "Call me old-fashioned."

As they exchanged knowing smiles, Riley found herself relieved that after her and Gabriel's awkward sparring moment half a world ago, they were back to their usual banter. It meant the pair had once again managed to forget and move on. To Riley, this pattern seemed to be their modus operandi whenever the shifting lines between protector, partner, and…something else…became blurred. Like when Jin Cong nearly managed to convince Gabriel to shoot her, and she had begged him to look at her and listen to his heart instead of his head. They didn't talk about that, either, even though Riley was morbidly curious to know what sort of feelings looking at her had invoked.

No. It didn't matter. In the end, he had lowered his gun and together they had saved the day. Then Riley had to forget and move on. She _needed_ to forget and move on. There could be no lingering. No wondering, and no questioning. There was just the job, and the job was keeping Gabriel alive.

Anything else was dangerous.

Arriving at to the front desk, the woman who greeted them and asked for their names looked like she was trying to win the award for biggest smile. After a few finger taps on her monitor, she handed them plastic access cards for room 2016 - one floor below the presidential suite where Finnegan was staying.

"You will find the elevators in a hallway around the corner and on the left, across from the Italian café," the woman explained, with a noticeable Japanese accent. Giving a bow, she thanked them for their patronage and hoped they would enjoy their stay.

After returning their own thanks, Riley and Gabriel made their way over, luggage rolling behind them. Passing by more artwork and marble, they were just turning into the hallway – the entrance of which was guarded by a pair of eight foot black and white ceramic heads – when Gabriel suddenly stopped.

Riley's guard went up. Searching for danger, she put a hand over the gun hidden under her blazer. "What is it?"

Gabriel's eyes flickered, looking at something she couldn't see. He must have gone back to watching the cams at some point, and had spotted something amiss.

"Gabriel…?" Riley prompted. "Talk to me."

He met her gaze and quirked an eyebrow. "I suddenly feel like taking the stairs."

Riley blinked.

That had to be a joke.

"It's _twenty _flights," she reminded him, relaxing her guard and feeling annoyed. There was a ding from an elevator at her left, so she jerked at the handle of her luggage and walked towards it. "Why on earth would you want to – "

The doors of the elevator slid open and Riley stopped dead in her tracks as she came face to face with her favourite person: Special Agent in Charge Charlie Griffin.

Ah. Now she understood.

"Thriller!" Griffin exclaimed, flashing her a grin wide enough to give the woman at the front desk some competition for the biggest smile prize. Stepping off the elevator, he eyed Riley's suitcase. "You just got in, huh? I was just coming down to do another sweep of the floor. How's that for timing?"

"Good enough that I'll go out and buy myself a lottery ticket," Riley joked, trying to sound friendly.

Griffin chuckled and she was impressed with how much smoother things already were in comparison to Syria. No underhanded jokes, no overinflated ego. It was all going according to plan.

"Though…" Riley tested. "I could have sworn you promised not to call me that name again."

Her plan had been simple enough. Although Gabriel thought the last time she and Griffin had seen each other was the black op in Syria, the truth was that after months of the Secret Service agent's badgering and pleads that he wanted to 'make peace' for Panama and stealing her promotion to Detail Leader, Riley had finally agreed to meet him for coffee just a couple of weeks ago after coming to two conclusions. First, she had figured that if they did have coffee together, he'd finally leave her alone. Second, Riley knew from a mission standpoint that it was better to let Griffin think he was clearing the air between them so that in the off-chance they ever worked together again, he would act like a decent human being instead of a complete and utter tool. She knew, of course, that Griffin wasn't really sorry for what he did, and this peacemaking over coffee was just his attempt to keep up appearances now that the cat was out of the bag. Lucky for him, Riley was willing to play along.

On the afternoon they'd met for coffee, Griffin had been busy prepping for President Finnegan's Asian tour, which meant the get-together had been brief. For almost thirty minutes, though, he did little else but apologize for Panama and stealing Riley's promotion, lament that they'd never had a chance to talk about it before she up and vanished, and beg her forgiveness. She had to hand it to Griffin, though. He'd come across as so repentant and sincere, that Riley had almost believed him.

"Sorry, sorry." Griffin raised his hands defensively over the offending code name, flashing her a playful smile. "I forgot. You don't like it."

Almost.

Smiling at her, the playfulness was replaced with something softer. Something that made Riley immediately wonder if things were going a little _too_ well.

"It's good to see you again," he confided. "Last time just wasn't long enough."

Yup. Forget acting like a decent human being – Griffin seemed to be gunning for a second coffee, which meant the first one hadn't just been for an apology after all. He'd been testing the waters.

Damn it. And she'd walked right into it, too. That was just _great_.

To make matters worse, Gabriel was still behind her watching all the drama unfold. He was going to have a field day harassing her about this. Thank God he only knew the half of it.

As if on cue, the charming devil himself materialized at Riley's elbow, so close she could practically feel him. "I dunno. Felt long enough to me," he said, unaware that the other man meant a café meet-up, and not getting shot at in Syria. "Griffin," Gabriel nodded in greeting.

Any softness in Griffin's eyes was immediately replaced with detachment as he coolly acknowledged Gabriel's presence. "Vaughn." Then he shot Riley a quick glance before opening his mouth for a come-back.

Uh-oh.

"So, Griffin – " Riley jumped in. "Any suspicious activity? Things we should be on the lookout for?"

The agent paused for a second, studying her, then mercifully shook his head. "Nothing yet. My detail's been doing sweeps since 6:00 a.m., as well as watching who's been coming in and out on the cams. So far, this place is secure."

That was close.

Riley knew that Griffin had been about to correct Gabriel's misconception of their actual 'last time'. But there was a very specific reason why Riley had never told her partner about meeting Griffin for coffee: if the truth came out, she'd never hear the end of it. Especially now that her plan had backfired.

Eying their suitcases, the Secret Service agent continued on. "I'm assuming you'll want to do a sweep of the Grand Ballroom. Finnegan's been in meetings all day in the suite, and he's still got a couple more so once you've settled in, just give the suite a ring and I'll join you."

Although Griffin was technically speaking to both of them, his gaze stayed on Riley and she saw Gabriel shift out of the corner of her eye.

He didn't like the idea. Big surprise there.

"Okay," Riley nodded before her partner could say otherwise. "We'll meet you there."

As much as she didn't want to give the impression of encouraging his attention, the reality was that Griffin had been at the hotel longer than both her and Gabriel had, which meant that combined with his trained eye, the agent was a good asset for pointing out things they otherwise might have missed. Feelings aside, it would be foolish to turn down that kind of assistance when there was an assassination to stop, and Riley knew it. She had to stay on problem, and deal with everything else later.

"All right," the Detail Leader nodded, looking more than a little pleased. "I'll see you soon, then."

With short good-byes, Riley and Gabriel left Griffin in the hallway and headed into an elevator decorated with a blue and white watercolour that reminded Riley of a gently floating locus.

Gabriel pressed the button for the 20th floor. The door slid shut and it took all of three seconds before he turned to his partner with a look of half amusement, half confusion. "The hell was that?"

Riley played it cool. "What're you talking about?"

"You and Captain Underpants going on like besties all of a sudden." He watched her closely, waiting to be enlightened. "Care to explain?"

She shrugged like she couldn't make sense of it either. "I guess he just decided to stop being a huge tool."

Gabriel considered her answer for a long moment, then gave a snort and faced the front. "Remind me to buy the two of you matching friendship bracelets. I'm thinking pink and purple."

Riley sighed. It was going to be a long night.


	3. The Third Floor

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Grand Hyatt Tokyo Room 2016  
16:22 JST**

Gabriel walked into their Grand Twin room and took an appreciative look around. "Nice digs," he commented. The room was spacious enough, with two beds and a night table lined along the wall to his left, and a desk with one chair and a 32 inch flat screen TV at his right. Between the beds and desk, and directly in front of him, ran a length of windows which boasted a panoramic eastern view of the Tokyo cityscape. In truth, though, his attention wasn't so much on the room as it was on his partner as she walked past him and dropped her suitcase onto the bed closest to the windows.

"There's so much mahogany in here, I bet they used a whole tree," Riley observed. Spotting the television, she nodded towards it. "Let's hook up the tablet and see if Nelson's got any more intel."

"Yeah," Gabriel replied absently, staying where he was. It might have looked like he was admiring the view of the red and white striped Tokyo Tower off in the distance, but in truth he had been watching his partner for tells since before getting on the elevator.

After a few seconds of watching her unzip her suitcase, Gabriel sighed.

Riley had a damn good poker face.

Giving up for the moment, he turned to the other bed and unceremoniously dropped his suitcase onto it, feeling more than a little frustrated at the whole situation.

Ever since Griffin had bounced into the lobby with that idiot smile on his face, Gabriel had been trying to figure out what was going on. It didn't take a chip in his brain to know that something wasn't adding up, and it bothered him that Riley seemed to be in conspiracy mode over it. He didn't buy her claim for a second that Griffin's Prince Charming routine was brought on by some random change of heart. Griffin wasn't the type, for one. And there was no reason for them to be on such good terms considering how things in Syria had ended.

Unless…

A vice clamped hard in Gabriel's chest.

Unless Riley and Griffin had secretly gotten back together.

Gabriel let out a long, deep sigh as the vice tightened around his heart, and he wasn't sure what bothered him more: the fact that Riley might have actually hooked back up with that idiot, or the fact that he cared so damn much.

Christ – no. Stop. He didn't care. He _didn't_ care, and there was nothing going on between his partner and that joke of a Detail Leader. No way, no how. She _hated _him. There had to be some other piece of the puzzle he was missing.

But what? And why was Riley hiding it?

Of course, all Gabriel had to do was use the chip to pull up her phone records, check her texts and emails, her bank statements, track the GPS on her car…she'd be furious, probably murder him for it, but at least he'd know the truth in about five –

"Hey," Riley cut in. She was staring at him expectantly; a roll of HDMI cable in her hands. "You okay, space cadet?"

Snapping out of his thoughts, Gabriel realized he'd been staring blankly at his unopened suitcase for easily a minute. She probably thought he was trying to unpack it with his mind. Gabriel turned to her in reply, taking in the small tease of a smile on her lips, the watchfulness in her sharp blue-green eyes, the way the late day sunlight streaming through the windows backlit her with a golden glow.

"Gabriel…?"

Damn it, he couldn't do it. He couldn't use the chip to get his answers. Not when it would mean breaking his promise to not snoop into her private life. Riley trusted him and he couldn't violate that trust, no matter how tempted he was. She meant more to him than that.

And besides, he didn't care.

"Yeah, I'm good. Never better," Gabriel replied, reaching for the cable. "Although probably not as good as Griffin, judging from that Colgate smile he gave you. Practically needed sunglasses."

Okay, just because he wasn't going behind Riley's back with the chip didn't mean he couldn't still fish for answers above board. But not because he cared. He didn't. He was just…screening.

She handed him the cable with a shrug. "Hadn't noticed."

Gabriel frowned at the lie. Was Riley _trying _to mess with his head?

Taking a tablet and power cord from her suitcase, she turned away from him and went to the desk to plug the tablet in.

"I'm just saying," he continued, unraveling the HDMI cable, "you better be careful or you'll have a little Secret Service puppy following you around trying to hump your leg."

Riley shot him a dirty look over her shoulder. "Ew." Having plugged in the tablet, she left it to power up on the desk and turned around to confront him. "Did it ever occur to you that maybe we're both just being professionals and doing our jobs?" She raised an eyebrow at him, crossing her arms. "You should try it sometime."

Gabriel joined her at the desk and plugged the cable into the television. Flashing his best charming devil grin, he leaned close and captured her piercing eyes. "And make your life easier? Now why would I wanna do that?"

Although Gabriel had put himself a little too much into Riley's space, she didn't do anything but look up at him defiantly. "Good point," she murmured dryly. "I should just accept the fact that you're always going to be a pain in my ass."

The vice in his chest tightened again, and Gabriel surprised himself with his soft affirmation. "Always."

Christ, _what? _

Gabriel recovered quickly. "If you're lucky, that is."

Reaching quickly for the tablet, he plugged the other end of the cable into it and flipped on the TV. Riley remained silent, although he could tell she was watching him as she took a seat in the chair and he set the tablet in front of her. She immediately started to go through the passwords and connect to CDOC's secured network. The television flashed from a local news station to a black screen showing the red words of _TRANSMISSION CONNECTING_, and a second later, Nelson appeared on the screen. Dressed in his typical sweater-vest, he looked a bit bleary eyed behind his glasses. Although, that wasn't surprising considering the time was nearing 3:30 a.m. back in Virginia.

Riley gave him a sympathetic smile, positioning the tablet so its internal webcam would capture both her and Gabriel as he stood beside the chair. "Morning, sunshine," she said to the man on the television.

"In my books, it's not morning until I actually see the sun. This is just very, very…late. But hey," Nelson reached off screen and revealed a black, oversized coffee mug in the shape of Darth Vader's head. "That's why we invented these bad boys!" He smiled, taking a long sip.

Jameson came into view and hovered over Nelson's shoulder. "Just make sure I know to cover you when you're in the bathroom every five minutes," he said to his friend, looking only slightly more alert.

"Hey, Jameson," Riley said in greeting. "What's our status?"

Turning his attention to them both, the agent got down to business with a shake of his head. "Still no new intel about the second national. There hasn't been any more chatter since the initial interception, either."

"No surprises there," Gabriel replied. "You manage to get into the hotel's cams?"

Nelson set down his Vader mug and tapped at his keyboard. "Sure did. Man, there's a lot of them. I'm counting at least twenty on every floor. These guys don't mess around with security, huh?"

"Considering how pricey this place is, I'd say it's the least they can do," Riley stated. "So no new leads, but anything change with the op? Are the parameters the same?"

"No, actually," Jameson replied, glancing at something off screen. "Some new orders just came down the pipes."

Gabriel exchanged a wary look with Riley. "Go on."

"This isn't a wet op anymore," the agent continued. "When you find these guys, Prime Minister Abe has asked that whoever's behind this be taken _alive_, so watch where you're aiming."

"Yeah," Nelson chimed in, pointing his fingers into guns and randomly firing in the air. "So Gabriel, none of that _pew pew pew _you do._"_

Jameson raised an eyebrow. "Right. Basically, Abe wants to make an example out of these yakuza members, and he can't do that if they're dead. Everything else is proceedings as planned, though. You find these guys, and take them out of play."

Gabriel wasn't too much of a fan of the new orders. "That'll make things harder," he observed. "Bet he'll be regretting it when a gang member is holding a gun to his head and using him as a human shield."

Riley looked up at him; her expression serious. "You'll just have to find these guys before it gets to that point, and we'll take them out _quietly_. I don't want another 'uh oh' to deal with."

The last 'uh oh' had been the shooting of a Russian terrorist in California, who had made the fatal mistake of trying to aim his shotgun at Riley's chest. Nothing about that killing had been an accident.

"You're such a killjoy," Gabriel teased as he glanced at his watch. "And speaking of killjoys, shouldn't you be calling your new BFF? Don't want to make him wait, now, do we?"

Riley shot him a warning look as she stood from the chair. "I'll be quick," she said, walking towards the phone on the nightstand.

Unsurprisingly, both Jameson and Nelson looked confused. "Did we…miss something?" Jameson asked.

Gabriel shrugged and stole Riley's seat, half listening to her as she began speaking to someone on the other end of the line. "Just her and Griffin being all friendly and making plans together. Sure he stole her promotion, lied about it to her face, and was a huge prick in Syria, but hey – what's a little backstabbing between friends?"

Gabriel's neck snapped forward as something soft collided with the back of his head. Riley had thrown a pillow at him without breaking conversation.

Nelson stared, loudly whispering "I think she heard you."

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Grand Hyatt Tokyo Third Floor  
16:31 JST**

Riley's eyes were sharp as she stepped off the elevator into the large foyer. The first thing she noticed was how cool the air was as goose bumps raised under her blazer, and she guessed the temperature had been turned low in order to counteract the future body heat from hundreds of people.

Hmm. Air conditioning. Ventilation system. Maybe she'd ask Gabriel to chip more information about that when she was less annoyed at him.

Walking into the space, Riley pictured the building specs and immediately spotted the bar counter at her right. Orientating herself, she knew that behind her ran a curving flight of stairs which descended to the second floor, and an escalator beyond that. Straight ahead, a waiter walked out of one of the doors leading to the Grand Ballroom, carrying a tray of champagne bottles for the bar, and Riley could hear the tuning of stringed instruments wafting after him.

"Your bestie's in there," Gabriel said, nodding to where the waiter had just emerged. "He's talking to the General Manager." With an exaggerated sweep of his hand towards the ballroom, he motioned for her to lead the way. "Shall we get this over with?" he asked with sarcastic sweetness.

Riley elbowed him as she walked off, wondering who else she could ask about the ventilation system. She was still pissed that Gabriel had told Jameson and Nelson about Griffin's change in attitude, and if those two started grilling her, she'd break something. Like Gabriel's head. Or maybe Griffin's. Preferably both.

Riley set her jaw, forcing out her aggravation.

_Stay on problem_.

Coming to a stop in one of the entranceways, she moved her eyes critically around the Grand Ballroom, taking in the details and looking for problem areas. The room was massive – just under half the size of a football field – with row after row of tables covered in cream coloured linens and topped with fine china and bamboo centerpieces. In one corner, a bartender set up his cart next to a string quartet as they ran through a sound check on a raised platform. Down at the other end of the room, near a second bar cart, Griffin was holding a clipboard and speaking to a Caucasian man she recognized from her prep report as the hotel's manager. The man looked to be in his late 40's, with short dark hair and a crisp business suit.

Riley sensed Gabriel behind her. "Anything yet?" she asked.

There was a pause as his chip pulled information. "Nope – all clean. Although that second violin could use a tuning."

"Great, only 657 people to go." She turned to him, feeling smug. "And it's the viola that's off."

Gabriel smirked. "Remind me to buy you symphony tickets for your birthday."

"Riley!" Griffin had spotted her and waved with the clipboard, motioning for her to join him and the manager.

Crossing her arms, she gave Gabriel a warning look. "Remember; don't do anything too chippy. And be nice," she ordered, before walking towards the two men.

"When am I not?" he replied, following after.

As they made their way over, Riley continued scanning the room. She took in the twenty-foot ceiling with its red-tinted droplights, and tried to decide if plastic explosives could be hiding amongst the wires. She noted the absence of windows, which meant no sniper could make a long-distance shot from a nearby building, but also meant that any shooting would end up being close-range. She counted 60 tables and wondered how easy it would be to tape a gun underneath the tablecloth.

Griffin gestured to her as they drew near, speaking to the General Manager who looked anxious as he straightened his tie. "Christophe, this is Special Agent Riley Neal. Former Secret Service. She and her partner will be the ones focused solely on finding and stopping whoever is behind this assassination attempt. Riley, this is Christophe Lorvo; the GM."

Riley extended her hand and Lorvo shook it firmly. "Pleasure to meet you," she said. "Your hotel is lovely."

"The pleasure is mine." Lorvo gave her a weak smile, speaking in a noticeable French accent. "I have heard nothing but good things about you from Agent Griffin, and trust you will take care of this…issue…as discreetly and quickly as possible. I do not want my guests to know that anything is amiss." The man looked like he hadn't slept in a day, which was probably true. There was a lot at stake for Lorvo; not just lives, but his hotel's reputation.

"Of course," Riley replied, wondering exactly what those 'good things' were as she motioned to Gabriel. "And this is my partner; Special Agent Gabriel Vaughn."

Gabriel appraised the man. "You initiated a 'Smiles for All' fundraising campaign after the earthquakes in 2011. Raised quite a lot of money for disaster relief." He extended his hand, smiling. "It's nice to see big chains not forgetting that they're still part of a community."

Despite his nerves, Lorvo beamed. "Thank you very much," he replied, shaking the offered hand enthusiastically. "We of course opened our doors to all those without electricity or who were unable to return home after the earthquake. Roppongi Hills uses its own source of power, so we weren't affected by the power outages."

Griffin nodded. "That reminds me. I want you to take Agent Harris down to the breaker room so she can check for tampering." He spoke into the com at his wrist. "Barbara, I'm sending Christophe to you." As Lorvo left to meet the agent, Griffin turned his attention to Riley. "Welcome to party central," he smiled, gesturing around like it was him who had the title of GM.

For the next thirty minutes, Griffin was happy to play tour guide as he walked Riley through the kitchen and around the room, answering her questions, and pointing out changes in the set up. The string quartet, for instance, had moved at the last minute from one corner of the room to the other in order to have better lighting. Although Gabriel had gone on the sweep with them, he had remained mercifully silent; probably busy running facial recognitions and background checks on everyone he saw both in person and on the cams.

Ending their inspection by one of the bar carts, Riley glanced at her watch before turning to Gabriel. "We'd better go change soon. We still need to do a sweep of the garage before Abe comes."

"Agent Neal?" Lorvo appeared at her side, now dressed in a tuxedo for the evening's events. He nervously pulled at his bowtie. "May I have a word, please?"

She glanced at Gabriel. "Sure."

Lorvo led her a few paces away as he fidgeted with the cufflinks at his wrist. "I do not mean to add more pressure on top of what I can imagine is a very stressful task for you," he began. "But please, I beg you to take care of this issue as quickly as possible. The safety of our guests is paramount."

Riley nodded, feeling sorry for the man. "You don't have to worry about a thing," she said reassuringly. "America sent its top agent to find these guys."

Even if America's top agent was a pain in her ass.

Lorvo nodded, but didn't relax. "Thank you," he said, forcing a smile. "I very much appreciate it."

As the GM walked away, Riley turned back to see Gabriel looking at her like he couldn't choose between laughing hysterically and murdering someone. Saying something to Griffin she couldn't hear, he moved purposefully towards her. She eyed him cautiously. Something was definitely up.

"We done here?" Gabriel asked, a bit forcefully.

Riley crossed her arms. "What's going on?" Looking over his shoulder, she saw Griffin flipping through the pages on his clipboard. "What were you two talking about?"

"Cookie recipes," Gabriel snapped. "Let's go."

She paused for a moment, trying to decide whether it was worth prodding him. No, not here. Riley gave him a nod instead. "Yeah, okay. Let's get changed."

They walked towards the elevators. The door opened instantly on their approach – had Gabriel done that? – and he punched the button for the twentieth floor once they were inside. By that point, Riley could practically feel the anger radiating off of him in waves. She stared at him. "Okay, spill. What's going on? What's got you all riled up all of a sudden?"

Gabriel looked straight ahead and at first Riley was afraid he was going to ignore her. Then, after a moment, he let out a long, slow sigh; the kind he reserved for when he was really pissed off. "That guy doesn't deserve you, you know," he finally murmured.

What the hell…?

"Who, Griffin?" Riley eyed him warily, trying to decipher the origin of his comment. "No one said he did."

Gabriel didn't reply. In fact, the rest of the elevator ride was spent in silence.


	4. Protection

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Grand Hyatt Tokyo Room 2016  
17:24 JST**

Gabriel sat uncomfortably in the desk chair, trying not to wrinkle the freshly pressed tuxedo that had been rented for him as he used the webcam in Riley's tablet like a mirror. Watching himself on the screen as he pulled and tugged with annoyance at the bowtie under his chin, every effort he made to tie it nicely just made the damn thing more lopsided and uneven. Geez, he hated suits.

"Hey, Riley, you about done in there?" Gabriel called, trying to keep the frustration from his voice.

She'd been in the bathroom for the last twenty minutes – had practically beelined for it with her garment bag once they'd arrived back in the room, murmuring something about having a shower and doing her hair, and hadn't been seen since.

"Just about," Riley called back through the door. "You?"

"I'm a guy. I was ready in three minutes."

"Must be nice."

To be honest, it had been a relief to get away from her. To have a bit of a break to collect his thoughts without Riley watching, trying to solve him like a puzzle. At least she had known better than to keep pressing him in the elevator. She must have sensed he was having a hard enough time resisting the urge to go back down to the third floor, find Griffin, and break his jaw.

Griffin. That _jackass. _

Gabriel tugged hard at one of the ends in frustration, and the bowtie practically came undone in his hands. "Damn it!" he cursed, pounding his fists down onto the desk. Maybe he'd find the man who invented bowties and break his jaw instead.

Riley called to him immediately, sounding worried. "What's going on? Is everything okay?"

"Everything's _fine,_"he snapped angrily, although immediately regretted it. Cursing himself, Gabriel tried for something softer. "I mean, I'm good. Just having a wardrobe malfunction."

On the other side of the door, Riley wisely remained silent instead of pointing out that Gabriel had already told her he was ready.

It had to be the jetlag. The time change was starting to catch up with him, and it was making him irritable and moody. It had nothing to do with the bowtie. Nothing to do with Riley, and definitely nothing to do with what Griffin had said about her. He was just jetlagged and needed coffee.

Of course, the painful twisting in his chest and anger bubbling up his throat told Gabriel otherwise.

Damn it, what the hell happened to not caring?

In front of him, the television flashed and the screen filled with the digitized Nelson, sitting at his desk and looking a little more awake. "Hey, Rhett Butler, nice suit," Nelson quipped, saluting Gabriel with his Vader mug as he looked him over. "Though you might want to work on that bow. Or get a clip-on. Man, those things saved me in grad school." Not waiting for a response, Nelson engrossed himself with looking behind Gabriel at the hotel room and failed to notice the man's growl as his irritation levels climbed. "You ready to take Scarlett O'Hara to the ball?" Nelson continued. Unable to spot Riley, he looked to Gabriel for help. "She, uh…she nearby?"

Gabriel nodded behind him towards the bathroom door. "Still getting ready," he replied, growing suspicious at the scientist's question. "Why? Something come up?"

Looking guilty, Nelson ducked his head and began to circle the rim of his mug with his fingers. "No, I just…wanted to wish her luck on the mission," he shrugged.

Gabriel scoffed. "You had to call in to do that? Couldn't just say it over the ear…" pausing, he frowned as a thought popped into his head. "Wait a second..."

Nelson started to shift uncomfortably, like a man under interrogation and about to crack.

"You just want to see Riley in a dress, don't you?" Gabriel accused, eyes narrowing.

The scientist buckled immediately. "Oh, come on!" he pleaded. "She always wears jeans! Don't act like you don't want to see her in a dress, too. When else am I going to get the chance – "

"_Nelson…" _Gabriel growled in warning. Had it been any other day, he probably would have started teasing his friend about being a peeping tom. Instead, he was making veiled threats. But Gabriel was already through with men wanting to take advantage of Riley's body.

Nelson was startled by Gabriel's tone. Cocking his head to the side in surprise, he looked the agent over and his expression turned into one of quizzical concern. "You okay, bro?" he ventured. "You seem…edgy."

Gabriel sighed, rubbing at his eyes with the heels of his hands as he wondered how many more times he'd be asked that question. Nelson was right, though, even if 'edgy' was a bit of an understatement. "Sorry," he said lamely. "Jetlag's a bitch."

"You sure that's all it is?" Nelson didn't look entirely convinced as he leaned forward on his desk and enlarged the television screen with his head, whispering conspiratorially. "Did you and Riley have a fight?"

"What?" Gabriel threw up his hands, exacerbated. "No, we didn't have a fight!"

Nelson immediately retreated back into his chair. "Okay, okay, take it easy. No need to get worked up. You know what happens when your amygdala's overstimulated."

Yeah, the same thing that happened when Amelia had dropped back into his life; he went off the rails.

"So," Nelson continued, speaking cautiously. "You're _sure _there's nothing bothering you? Because I'm here to talk if…" His sentence trailed off as something behind Gabriel caught his attention and his eyes went wide. "Oh, wow…"

Gabriel turned around in the chair and suddenly found himself standing, as if he'd been shocked to his feet. Frustration and anger fell away as he stared at the vision before him.

Riley.

She stood in the bathroom doorway, looking a bit startled by the utterly focused attention she was receiving from him. For a moment, the room was silent as she held Gabriel's gaze. Then, Riley ducked her head and studied the carpet as a bashful smile began to play across her lips.

Swallowing his heart back down his throat, Gabriel took Riley in, noting the way she had swept her hair to the right and allowed it free reign to curl in tendrils over her shoulder. The evening dress she wore was a red satin, shimmering with every movement and begging to be touched. Gabriel caught a sparkle of crystal beading that started under Riley's left arm, and his eyes moved down the curve of her waist and over her hip to where the beading ended mid-thigh. Where it stopped, however, the slit in Riley's dress began, and Gabriel shamelessly followed the teasing glimpse of bare leg all the way down to her silver heels. Overall, it was a bit disorienting for him to see his partner all dressed up, but at the same time, Gabriel couldn't take his eyes off her. He didn't even want to.

"Riley," Nelson started. "You look…"

"Beautiful," Gabriel finished, a bit breathlessly.

The sound of his own voice snapped him out of his trance. For God's sake, he sounded like some pimply-faced, love struck teenager picking up his date for prom.

Riley looked up at him with a mixture of surprise and doubt, as if she was second-guessing her own hearing. "…did you just say…?" she began in disbelief.

Gabriel cleared his throat. "I meant you clean up nice," he corrected. "Don't let it go to your head."

She nodded, as if that's what she thought he had meant the whole time. "You clean up nice, too," Riley replied with a shy smile, suddenly very focused on adjusting the straps of her dress. "Very James Bond, even if you can't work a bowtie to save your life."

"Couldn't find a YouTube tutorial," Gabriel lied, giving the limp fabric another useless tug.

"Here, let me," she offered, moving towards him. "My brother could never tie them, either."

Gabriel tried to turn down Riley's offer, but she was already in front of him, in his space, with eyes and nimble fingers focused on his throat. Breathing in vanilla, Gabriel balled his hands into fists at his side. His heart drummed a fast staccato and he realized he wanted some excuse – any excuse – to touch her, feel the softness of the dress, the bounce of her hair, the skin of her collarbone…

He snapped his eyes shut instead.

No. No, no, _no._

Clearing his throat for the second time, Gabriel stuffed his hands in his pockets. "So, James Bond, huh?" he asked, trying to distract himself as Riley continued tying the bow. "Who're you thinking? Daniel Craig?"

"Nice try," she teased. "You're not nearly that handsome."

Gabriel cocked an eyebrow, unable to resist. "Ah, but you do think I'm handsome."

"No, I – " Riley stopped abruptly, realizing what she had admitted to.

Their eyes met, and Gabriel could swear on his old man's grave that he saw a blush on her cheeks.

_Christ. _

"_Gabriel_."

Startled, both he and Riley whipped their heads to the flat screen to see Jameson looking unimpressed as he glaring back with crossed arms and a raised eyebrow. Shooting Gabriel a warning look, the message the agent was sending was clear: _I thought I told you not to fall for her._

Beside him, Nelson smacked Jameson's arm, presumably for the interruption as he hissed "_What're you doing? Didn't you see - " _

"You two ready to go?" the agent asked sternly, ignoring the flack he was getting.

Riley darted an unreadable sideways glance at Gabriel before turning away and going to her suitcase on the bed. Fishing out a wireless earpiece, she fitted it into her left ear and set Jameson with a serious look; all traces of her blush gone. "Ready," she nodded.

"All right," Jameson nodded in return, adjusting the levels of her voice on the computer. "Operation Red Sun is now live."

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Grand Hyatt Tokyo Underground Parking Garage  
17:45 JST**

Gabriel and Riley stood by the doors of the service elevator as a stretch limo nestled between two black Escalades pulled up in front of them, precisely on time.

The driver of the limo parked, the front passenger door swung open, and a man Riley recognized from her prep report as the leader of the National Guard's detail stepped out. His name was Michio Iwa, and from what she remembered reading about him, he was the no-nonsense type. Standing several inches above the country's average height of 5' 6", Iwa wore a thin goatee and his long dark hair pulled back in a ponytail that trailed down his jacket. He was young for his ranking, not much older than Riley, and assessed her, Gabriel, and their surroundings in a fast second before he made a circling motion with his hand; the fluidity of his movements hinting at a powerful, agile body.

The doors of the Escalades opened at Iwa's signal and twelve guards, all dressed in tuxes with their services pieces visible, came to stand in silent, perfect formation around the PM's vehicle. After looking around once more, Iwa finally opened the back door of the limo for Prime Minister Abe, who stepped out with a friendly smile.

Riley glanced around, wishing her Sig was at her waist instead of in the small silver handbag which hung over her shoulder. Even with thirteen guards and Gabriel in the cams making it hard for anyone to pull off an ambush, she would have felt more at ease in pants, with easier access to her weapon. Stupid formalities.

Although, there was no denying those same formalities meant Gabriel was dressed in a fitted tux. Sneaking a quick, sideways glance at her partner, Riley had to concede she didn't mind that part one bit.

Riley gave her head a quick shake. Damn him. She was trying to forget the way he had looked at her when she'd walked out of the bathroom in her dress, just like she was trying to forget that heated little moment when she'd been fixing his tie, but…_damn _him. He really _was_ a handsome devil.

Abe walked towards them with Iwa at his heels, smiling and extending a hand in greeting. Like his guard and Gabriel, the Prime Minister also wore a tux; the only difference being the slightly extra bulk to his chest from the bulletproof vest hiding beneath his dress shirt. Clean-shaved and without a strand of white in his jet black hair, Abe could have passed as a much younger man that the wrinkles which creased his forehead and the deep-set bags beneath his eyes implied.

"You must be the Americans sent here to aid in my protection," Abe spoke, with a foreign slur to his t's. Shaking Gabriel's hand, he turned to Riley and shook hers as well. "Agent Vaughn, Agent Neal, thank you for coming. It is a pleasure to meet you both."

"You as well, sir," Riley replied.

Suddenly there was a crashing noise to their left, and everyone but Gabriel reacted. Pulling Abe behind him, Iwa had his gun drawn and pointed before Riley could even open her purse. With a precise chop of his hand, he dispatched two guards to investigate.

Standing at the ready between Gabriel and the sound of the commotion, Riley heard him speak up behind her.

"I wouldn't bother." From the relaxed tone of his voice, she could just imagine him calmly standing with his hands clasped, not even reaching for his gun as the men disappeared behind a line of parked cars. "Some of the hotel staff just started unloading a delivery of silverware and one of them dropped a tray. Gotta cut the guy some slack, though. He's only worked at the Hyatt for three weeks."

Sig out, Riley lowered it but continued acting as Gabriel's shield. She knew he was right, but didn't want to give the impression of just how right he was. The Prime Minister, of course, knew nothing about Clockwork.

Iwa glancing suspiciously at them both as he held his position in front of Abe.

Several moments later, the two guards returned. Their guns were already holstered and one of them began speaking in rapid Japanese to the others. Hearing the report, Abe stared at Gabriel with wide eyes, murmuring words in Japanese Riley assumed were baffled praise. Behind him, some of the men of his detail exchanged looks of bewilderment as they lowered their weapons.

Iwa glared at Gabriel.

"He said it was simply a clumsy worker, who dropped a silver platter," the Prime Minister translated, looking impressed. "The man begged forgiveness, stating he is new to his employment. Less than a month."

Dropping her gun back into her purse, Riley looked over her shoulder at Gabriel as he gave her a knowing smile.

"We've got this place covered," he stated reassuringly, speaking to Abe but keeping his eyes on her.

Riley smiled warily back, aware that Iwa was watching her partner suspiciously as he holstered his gun.

Abe turned to the leader of his guard. "I feel I am, as they say, in good hands," he said, spreading his own hands wide.

Iwa just nodded.

As they all loaded into the large service elevator, Nelson's voice was in Riley's ear. "I think you just earned yourself an A+, bro." Nelson also had access to the hotel cams, and if his proud tone was anything to go by, had watched the whole thing happen on the screens back in CDOC. Riley could just imagine his wide, excited grin. "Take _that_ Japanese technology!" he exclaimed in triumph. "You may have mech warriors, but America's got Gabriel!"

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Grand Hyatt Tokyo Grand Ballroom  
18:28 JST**

Gabriel slowly made his way past the string quartet, barely registering their performance of Mozart's lively 'Dissonance IV' in C major – one of the Doc's favourites. He was focused; with almost all of the chip's processing power dedicated to scanning the faces of nearly six hundred of Japan's most rich, famous, and influential as they talked over hors d'oeuvres, laughed at inside jokes, and drank from crystal champagne flutes with bobbing raspberries.

The rest of his attention was on Griffin, and making sure he stayed the hell away from Riley.

After spending the last half hour scanning faces as he walked the room, nothing yet was amiss. Abe's entrance had been problem-free and met with enthusiastic applause, then walking up to a podium and facing the crowd, the Prime Minister had introduced President Finnegan; humbly welcoming him as Japan's guest of honour. The cheers had been deafening as Finnegan had entered the ballroom, waving appreciatively with Griffin and co. close behind.

The Detail Leader must have been looking for her as he walked in. Despite the large crowd, it took Griffin all of ten seconds spot Riley, and Gabriel's stomach had flipped as he watched the man's eyes nearly bulge out his head. Then, to Gabriel's burning anger, Griffin's expression had changed to the type of look a predator wore in the moments before it took down its prey.

He should have seen it coming - especially when Griffin had practically made his intentions known during their little chat after the sweep. Still, it didn't stop Gabriel from finding the closest waiter with alcohol and downing a glass on the spot.

Riley, thank God, had actually been doing her job and had missed the whole thing. But it had been in that moment Gabriel swore he wouldn't let Griffin so much as blink near his partner.

So far, his plan was going well. From his current position by the quartet, he was much too far away to see through the throngs of people, but knew from the cams that Griffin was currently standing with Iwa near their protectees as the two nation's leaders carried on conversation at the other end of the room, surrounded by an entourage of well-dressed listeners. Gabriel had picked out the rest of the presidential detail as they walked inconspicuously through the crowd, and figured there wouldn't be any sort of rotations for still some time.

Scrutinizing Griffin on the cam, a bubbling of anger rose up in Gabriel's chest as the man looked around, probably searching for Riley as much as he was searching for danger.

Luckily, he wouldn't find her. Riley was standing about twenty feet from Gabriel, surveying the room from near the bar cart next to the quartet while the server took drink orders. She was safe from Griffin, but apparently not safe enough from a graying man the chip had told Gabriel was one Satoshi Morimoto, who sat at a nearby table and ogled Riley behind Coke bottle glasses he must have stolen from the 80's.

This, at least, Gabriel could handle.

Catching her eye, he nodded at the older man. "Careful, partner," he teased over the mic. "I think the Minister for Defence is getting sweet on you."

Riley arched a playful eyebrow. "If he asks for my number, I'll try and score us a couple bombs," she teased right back.

"I'd be happy with just a Global Hawk drone," Jameson chimed in through the earpiece. "Gabriel, anything yet?"

"No." Gabriel turned and faced the crowd. "I'm running outta A-listers to scan, and none of them so far tie directly back to Takayama or the Yamaguchi clan." He shook his head. "Whoever these people are, they're ghosts."

An attractive woman dressed in silky black and pearl earrings smiled at Gabriel as she sashayed by, sipping a glass of red wine. He scanned her face and immediately brought up her profile. Ryoko Yonekura; age thirty-eight. Former actress and model. Won a national young beauty award at the age of eighteen by sleeping with one of the judges.

"But you should see some of the dirt I'm digging up," Gabriel smirked.

Jameson chuckled. "A room full of politicians, industry leaders, and cultural icons? Yeah, I'll bet."

At that moment, Gabriel spotted Agent Thomas approach Griffin on the cams. He remembered shaking hands with the line-backer sized Secret Service agent on the plane to Syria, and watched closely as Thomas exchanged words with the DL. Then, Thomas pointed straight in Riley's direction, and Griffin walked off, leaving Thomas to cover Finnegan.

Hot anger flared up Gabriel's chest again. "Oh no, you don't," he growled.

Behind him, the quartet finished with Mozart and immediately began the Russian favourite 'On the Hills of Manchuria'; a haunting song with a beat meant dancing.

It gave Gabriel an idea.

Walking over to Riley, he brazenly took her by the hand and pulled her from the bar cart, leading her towards the musicians as they weaved along with the music.

"What is it? What do you see?" Riley asked, sounding alarmed.

Gabriel resisted answering. Stopping in front of the musician's stage, he faced Riley, raised their linked hands, and placed her other hand on his shoulder. Then he placed his own low on Riley's shoulder blade, pulled her in, and held her tight. His heart sped up immediately.

Would she kill him for this? Did he even care?

Nope.

By then, Riley had figured out his plan. "Gabriel…" she warned sternly.

"Just follow my lead," he said with a dangerous grin.

A new voice rang loud in his ear as he moved his feet in time with the music, leading Riley through the steps.

"Gabriel, what the _hell _are you doing?" It was Lillian. About time she joined the party.

"Classy lady like you? Can't you tell?" Gabriel teased, winking at one of the cams as he and Riley danced below it. "The waltz."

"I'm fully aware of that," his boss snapped in aggravation. "What I'm asking is _why._"

Riley looked anything but amused as he led her around in beats of three, but didn't try to break away. Maybe because she didn't want to make a scene, but he hoped it was for another reason.

"Lillian's right, Gabriel," she hissed. "We're supposed to be finding the yakuza assassin, remember?" Her eyes darted at the crowd as people began to stare. They weren't exactly on a dance floor.

"Relax, I see more people by running facial recognitions from the cams, anyway." Gabriel grinned at her, using a cam close to one of the entryways to scan a new face. "The CEO of Japan's largest cell phone company just arrived. Did you know he's worth $9.1 billion?"

Riley wasn't impressed.

"Gabriel…" Lillian threatened in his ear.

"Just enjoy yourself for once," he insisted, ignoring his boss. "Especially since I find out now that you've been holding out on me. You're one hell of a dancer, Riley." And it was true. There was a grace and fluidity to her movements that he didn't know she had.

The woman was full of surprises.

"I'll enjoy myself after the mission's over," she replied flatly, but still didn't let go.

Gabriel took in the warmth of her body beneath his hands. The hint of a reluctant smile forming on Riley's lips. "That a promise?" he asked, a little too seriously.

"_Gabriel_." Lillian spat his name like a curse. "It's one thing to scan faces from the cameras, but do you really need to be _waltzing _while you – "

He clicked a button at his ear and her voice went silent.

Riley shook her head at him as they danced across the floor. "She's going to kill you for that, you know."

Gabriel shrugged, not giving a damn as he held her in his arms. "It's all for a worthy cause," he muttered.

"Worthy cause?" Riley looked at him skeptically, her brown locks sweeping through the air with every turn. "You're trying to tell me that us waltzing is somehow keeping the Prime Minster safe?"

"_Vaughn_."

Riley's head snapped towards the sound and Gabriel tensed, instinctively pulling his partner closer as he continued their dance.

"No, not the Prime Minister," Gabriel admitted, his jaw clenching as he saw Griffin draw near. The man's eyes darted between him and Riley. "You."


	5. Discoveries

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Grand Hyatt Tokyo Grand Ballroom  
18:35 JST**

Riley's breath caught in her throat as Gabriel continued their dance, leading them so that he faced Griffin and she faced the wall. Tendrils of unease snaked from her chest. "_Me?"_

What the hell…?

What the _hell?_

Gabriel said nothing, but his expression became stony and focused on the man behind her. Leading Riley through a basic box step, her twisting sense of unease quickly spread as she realized why he had minimized their movements. Only dancing within a square meant Gabriel would always be facing the Secret Service agent. He wasn't planning on turning his back to him.

Did this all have something to do with what the two men had been talking about earlier? And why Gabriel had been so angry in the elevator?

Riley watched her partner closely, feeling the growing tension in his body through her own. The rigidity in his fingers as he held her hand. The stiffness of his arm muscles beneath her arm. The knotting in his shoulder against her palm. The tightness she saw in his jaw line as he clenched his teeth. Her unease coiled into heavy lead within her chest.

Whatever was going on, it had gotten worse.

"Griffin?" Gabriel practically growled at the man.

Riley heard Griffin's voice over her shoulder and could just imagine him standing there with hands on hips, looking unimpressed. She kept her eyes on Gabriel.

"You mind explaining to me how you expect to catch some yet-to-be unidentified assassins while you're busy cutting a rug?" the Secret Service agent glowered.

Gabriel's normally blue-gray eyes were dark, like an approaching storm. "I've got it covered."

"You've 'got it covered'?" Griffin repeated, barking a mirthless laugh. "That's the best you can come up with?" There was a pause and Riley could practically hear him shaking his head. "I somehow doubt that."

"Doubt all you want," Gabriel retorted. There was a strain in his neck muscles. "Doesn't change the fact that it's true."

"Right," the DL mocked. "I must have missed the part in my prep report that says you're actually a magician. Let me guess - next you'll pull a rabbit out of your hat. I've got a dollar bill – wanna make it disappear?"

Gabriel squeezed Riley's hand and she could see in the flash of his eyes and purse of his lips that he was restraining himself from replying. Either that, or rearranging Griffin's face.

Riley craned her neck around until she could just spot her former coworker in her peripheral. "I know it may not look like it, Griff, but we really do have this covered." She spoke in a soothing tone, hoping it would help placate the growing cloud of hostility that was building around her.

Griffin wasn't convinced. "Come on, Riley, I can't let you be a part of this." He held out his hand to her, like she needed rescuing, and Gabriel sucked in his breath. "Let me get you a drink, and we can do a rotation."

For the briefest instant Griffin's gaze raked down her body, and that's when Riley saw it. The dangerous half-smile and dark eyes she had called The Look when they had been dating. It was the same expression that had been on his face in Panama after they had saved the VP and taken him home - right before Griffin's mouth had collided with hers and he had ripped her shirt off.

Oh, _hell_, no.

Gabriel's fingers curled hard against her back and she swore she heard him growl under his breath. Geez, had he seen it, too? Was _that _what this was about?

"We're in the middle of an op, Griff," Riley replied, fighting to keep her voice neutral. "I'm not drinking on the job, and I'm not leaving my partner."

The rejection didn't faze Griffin. "One's not going to kill you, and you're better off without him if this is how he plans on spending the evening."

"I believe the lady said no," Gabriel cut in through grit teeth. "And I'm telling you, I've got it covered."

"Yeah?" Griffin withdrew his hand and crossed his arms, looking smug. A challenge was coming on. "Prove it. What's Abe doing right now?"

Whipping her head back around to her partner, Riley saw the hint of a triumphant smile on his face. "Gabriel…" she warned.

"He's talking to Finnegan on the other side of the room. Iwa and Thomas are with them," he easily answered.

Okay, that hadn't been _too _chippy.

"And…?" she heard Griffin prompt, sounding unimpressed.

Riley and Gabriel exchanged looks.

Oh, boy…

"And there are other five people standing around listening to them talk," Gabriel began. His eyes started to dart through the air, and Riley could just picture the information he was pulling up. "The man in the red tie at Abe's left is Ken Takakura; Japan's own Clint Eastwood. He's been arrested fourteen times, mostly for public intoxication, but once for sending a nosy photographer to the hospital. Next to him are Mr. and Mrs. Kunio Busujima. Kunio's company makes Pachinko machines and last year the business was investigated for allegedly donating over a million dollars to Abe's cabinet in exchange for being in the Parliament's good books. It was Kunio's idea. The guy with the scotch, Tatsunori Hara, is the manager for the Tokyo Giants. In 2012 he had an affair with his son's English tutor and had to pay a ransom in hush money when someone threatened to go public. Word got out anyway and the press _thought_ the yakuza were behind the blackmail, but it was actually the wife's sister. Last but not least, we have Dr. Chiaki Mukai; Japan's first female astronaut. When she first got the invitation to tonight's banquet, she emailed her best friend and asked if she'd go dress shopping. Then the doc renewed her gym membership." Gabriel paused to give Riley a wry smile. "She's been there every day since."

In that moment, the quartet played their last notes of the Russian waltz and Riley promptly kicked Gabriel in the foot the moment he brought their dance to its conclusion. "That's some party trick," she hissed angrily.

"Hey, he asked for it," her partner murmured back, not looking the least bit remorseful as he continued holding their positions. Looking over Riley's shoulder, Gabriel's lips curled up with a loaded smile. "Oh, and Griffin – Abe's champagne glass is almost empty. Maybe you wanna get _him _a drink."

Riley extracted herself from her partner's embrace, feeling the chill ghost of his hand on her back. Facing Griffin, she watched the man blinking in astonishment at what her partner had reported.

"How the hell...?" he began, looking at Gabriel like he couldn't decide whether to accuse him of being the biggest charlatan in the world or a real-life Professor X. After a moment and a quick shake of his head, he turned to Riley. "Is this guy for real?"

Riley flashed Gabriel the briefest look of annoyance before giving Griffin a shrug, as if this was all perfectly normal and not a part of a top secret government project. "We've got it covered," she answered simply.

Griffin's eyes darted back and forth between her and Gabriel for a few seconds. Then, with one final suspicious appraisal of them both, he gave a _humph _and stalked away.

Riley watched the Secret Service agent disappear into the crowd. Then her heart tumbled in her chest. "Are we going to talk about – "

"Nope," Gabriel cut in.

Figures.

With a sigh, she mentally boxed every part of their dance away. Every emotion, every touch, every word spoken was banished, and Riley turned her attention back to the mission. They had an MIA assassin to find, and the night wasn't getting any younger.

With renewed focus, Riley faced her partner with the intention of discussing their next move, only to find that he was looking off in the direction of the bar cart.

"Huh…" Gabriel muttered, with eyebrows knit together in confusion.

Looking as well, Riley immediately spotted Christophe Lorvo, the General Manager, hunched over in conversation with the man behind the bar cart. If it was possible, Lorvo looked even more frazzled than he had been the last time Riley had seen him, with his eyes darting around and mouth scrunched in a frown as he spoke. Worry lines creased deep in his forehead and this time, instead of tugging at his cufflinks or adjusting his tie, Lorvo was playing with his watch. He twisted the platinum band around and around on his wrist like a nervous tic, almost neurotically.

If anyone needed a drink, it was him.

"What is it?" Riley asked.

"The server," Gabriel answered, not taking his eyes off the man. "I just noticed he's got a prosthetic finger, but there's nothing in his medical records about it."

A warned bell went off in Riley's head. "Prosthetic finger?" she repeated. Her eyes darted back to the server, right away spotting what Gabriel was looking at. Just as Lorvo was twisting his watch, the server was twisting the pinkie of his left hand around and around, as if the flesh and bone weren't connected to the rest of him.

The warning bell rang louder.

"Gabriel, tell me everything you have on that man," Riley ordered urgently.

After a quick glance at her, he stared into the space before him. "Name's Daiki Sugimoto. Thirty-six years old. Single. He's worked at the Hyatt since it opened in 2003. Started off as a dishwasher at the Chinaroom restaurant. Good credit history, no suspicious banking deposits, saves all his money for a rainy day." He looked back at Riley with a frown. "You think this is our guy? He's about as vanilla as it gets."

Gabriel had a point; even Sugimoto's appearance was plain. He had non-descript, short black hair, a flat nose, round face, and monolid eyes – in other words, the generic 'Asian' look. Other than the prosthetic finger, there was nothing noteworthy about him. The Secret Service tic that was gnawing at Riley's stomach, however, told her otherwise. Something wasn't adding up.

"Gabriel, in the yakuza if you commit an offence you have to cut off the tip of your left pinkie finger as punishment. Every time you commit an offence after that, you have to cut more off. It's a ritual called yubitsume." She watched as Sugimoto hunched down behind the cart and pulled out a deep green bottle of red wine. It had a white label on it, with the words "Le Pin" printed in red, cursive script. Holding the bottle out to Lorvo, the manager nodded his approval, still obsessively twisting his watch.

"Keep digging," Riley persisted, not taking her eyes off the waiter as he opened the bottle and flawlessly poured two glasses. Then he set both the glasses and the bottle on a serving tray. "Check his phone records, his emails, texts, browser history – everything. There has to be something we're missing." Then she looked at Lorvo as he took a few steps away from the cart and gestured for Sugimoto to follow with the tray. "Lorvo, too. Check it all again. And connect us back with CDOC."

"On it."

As Lorvo and Sugimoto began to walk off in the direction of Prime Minister Abe, Riley immediately followed, with Gabriel a step behind. Tailing the pair, she felt her purse over her shoulder, heavy with the weight of her Sig.

After a few moments of weaving around chatting guests and tables, Gabriel spoke. "Riley, I've got nothing." He sounded grim, but also baffled. "The hell is going on?"

"_Nothing?_" Riley shook her head, equally confused.

It didn't make any sense. How could some Joe-Blow with no visible connection to the Yamaguchi clan be sporting such a tell-tale sign that he was yakuza?

Riley kept her eyes glued to Sugimoto's back as he moved through the crowd, expertly balanced the tray on one hand. He and Lorvo were drawing closer to the Prime Minister and she still didn't know what they were dealing with. "How is that possible?" she asked out loud.

"Tell me about it. How can this guy be yakuza when he's not?" Gabriel replied. "Nelson, you catching this?"

"Yeah." Nelson sounded a shade miffed in Riley's earpiece. "So kind of you to let us back in on the mission."

Gabriel began discussing the situation to their friend, but Riley barely registered the conversation. Instead, she was playing and replaying Gabriel's question in her mind. Something about it had resonated, like the light from a match in the darkness.

How can he be yakuza when he's not?

How can he be yakuza…?

When he's not…?

How…?

The answer that roared to life in her brain stopped Riley dead in her tracks.

"Because he's not…" she breathed.

Gabriel was at her elbow, on high alert. "You got something?"

She looked at him, feeling a rush of adrenaline coursing all the way to her fingers and toes. "Sugimoto. _He's_ not yakuza." As Gabriel blinked at her answer, she took back off after Lorvo and the server, speaking rapidly into her earpiece. "Nelson – tell me about the facial scans that Gabriel does. How accurate are they?" Gabriel caught up with her and they exchanged glances. She could see him starting to connect the dots.

This was it. This _had _to be it. It was the only thing that made sense.

"Well," Nelson began, sounding a bit confused. "They're meant to be 100% accurate under ideal circumstances. Remember Luther Vick? The guy who was patient zero in that outbreak in Texas?"

"Charmer like that guy?" Gabriel asked, ducking around a waiter. "Who could forget?"

"Okay, so then you remember me telling you that the chip uses eighty-eight nodes of the human face to make a match," Nelson continued. "Basically, it comes down to math and placemarks on the face called nodal points. Facial recognition software like the kind you have, Gabriel, scans a person's face and defines those nodal points – like the distance between your eyes, the length of your jaw, width of your nose – then measures them. It's a very exact science, which is why it yields such accurate results."

They were closing in on Prime Minister Abe and President Finnegan. Riley could now hear them discussing baseball stats to their five avid listeners above the hum of the crowd. "But in theory," she asked, "if you were to mimic the nodal points on someone else's face, you could trick the scan into thinking you're someone else?"

"In _theory_, sure," Nelson replied. "But in _reality_ these scans are taking measurements on a sub-milimeter scale. To trick it, you'd have to employ some incredibly precise – "

"Prosthetics?" Gabriel finished, looking at Riley as his eyes lit up with understanding.

Lorvo and Sugimoto had reached the nations' leaders, and the Parisian GM was politely interrupting the conversation in order to introduce the bottle of wine he had imported from Bordeaux for the Prime Minister and their honoured guest.

Riley arched a brow. "Let's go find out."

* * *

**A/N: Every time I post a chapter, I keep telling myself I'm going to remember to give a big thank you to all of you out there who have been reading, reviewing, favouriting, following, and PMing me. You all rock so much. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, THANK YOU.**

**Also, because it's almost Easter, I have an Easter egg hunt for you. The people I've been writing about are real, but some of the details aren't. Have fun separating the fact from the fiction. ;)**


	6. Change of Plans

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Grand Hyatt Tokyo Grand Ballroom  
18:38 JST**

Gabriel took the lead as they closed in on the circle of people. The two nation's leaders faced Lorvo and Sugimoto – or whoever the hell he was – as the server stood ready to pass out the two glasses on his tray, and Lorvo proudly sang the praises of the dark green bottle in his hands. Filling the spaces in between were the same five men and women Gabriel had recited to Griffin earlier. Just behind their protectees, Iwa and Thomas surveyed the scene.

"Approach with caution and don't spook him," Lillian ordered in his ear. "There are too many people around. If Riley's theory is correct and he realizes his cover's blown, they could all be put in danger."

Gabriel shared a nod with his partner. "Copy that."

"You will love the downy flavours of mocha, black cherry, and currant," Lorvo boasted, holding the bottle for all to see. "Le Pin is a wine like no other." Nodding to Sugimoto, the server took a glass in his hand and stepped forward, offering it to Abe.

Before the Prime Minister had a chance to receive the drink, however, Gabriel cut through the circle and stepped in between, facing Sugimoto. "Pardon us for the interruption, folks," he said, clasping his hands in front of him. "But my partner and I need to borrow Mr. Sugimoto for a minute." He gave the imposter a reassuring smile, watching for tells. "Shouldn't take too long."

Lorvo's own smile fell and eyebrows knit together in concern over the sudden interruption. "Yes, uh, certainly," he replied, sounding frazzled as he began to twist his hand around the neck of the bottle. His eyes darted nervously to the people around them before fixing on Riley. "Is everything all right?"

She joined Gabriel in the middle of the circle, her voice calm and reassuring. "Everything's fine. We just need to get Mr. Sugimoto's take on a few matters."

Riley gestured towards the exits, but the server didn't move. He stood frozen in front of Gabriel, with the tray still poised in one hand and holding the offered wine glass in the other. A look of confusion marked his face. "My take?" he repeated with a heavy accent, not understanding the idiom.

"He's stalling," Lillian chimed in Gabriel's ear. "Get him out of there."

Finnegan piped up from behind to smooth things over. "They only want to ask a few questions, son," he explained. "Nothing to worry about. You're in good hands."

"A few questions?" Sugimoto continued, playing the innocent lamb card for all it was worth.

Lillian piped up again, sounding insistent. "Move him out."

"That's right," Gabriel said, reaching for the man's elbow to guide him away. "Just a few – "

Without warning, Sugimoto snapped his wrist upwards, throwing the contents of the wine glass straight at him.

Gabriel's arm jerked up, but he wasn't fast enough. The liquid splashed over his face, going up his nose and hitting his lips and teeth. "_Hey!"_ he sputtered.

"Gabriel!"

Shoved backwards as he wiped the wine from his eyes, Gabriel opened them just in time to see Riley in front of him, pulling the gun from her purse as the tray crashed to the floor and Sugimoto brought a hand over his wrist.

"Federal agents! Don't – "

Gabriel picked up a brief Wi-Fi signal, and the room plunged into darkness.

Screams erupted.

"What the hell just happened?!" It was Lillian. "We've lost all the cams!"

Pulling his gun, Gabriel felt the air shift in front of him, then the sound of a body hitting the ground. "The lights went out," he explained. "We're in the dark." He heard people moving and speaking all around, felt a drop of wine trail down his jaw, but all he saw was pitch black. "Riley?" His hand swept through empty space. "Riley, where are you?"

She cursed. "Almost had him." Her voice was angry and urgent, and coming from the floor. "Sugimoto – he must have killed the power." The direction of her voice changed and he guessed Riley was getting to her feet. "I saw him press a button on his watch. Gabriel, I can't see anything – can you?"

"Nothing." Heart beating in his chest, Gabriel took a few steps forward and continued sweeping an arm through the void. That damn imposter couldn't have gotten far if Riley had just missed him. Was he going after Abe in the dark?

"What was the watch? A detonator?" Lillian persisted. "Did Sugimoto blow up the fuse boxes?"

Remembering that Griffin had arranged for the fuse boxes to be inspected, Gabriel doubted that was the cause. Accessing the hotel's power grid, it appeared in front of him like a glowing checkerboard with connecting lines that pulsed red in the darkness. Above the board, two words flashed urgently: _System Override. _"It wasn't a detonator. I think his watch triggered some kind of a computer virus," Gabriel explained. "It took over the main controls and shut the whole building down." His hand found a bare arm he hoped was his partner's. "Riley? You okay?" She must have been standing right in front of him, but Gabriel still couldn't see her.

"A little rug burn but I'll survive," she answered. "You?"

Drips of liquid ran down Gabriel's temple. He could still taste black cherry and mocha on his tongue; smell it as he breathed. "Of all the things I've been attacked with, a glass of $900.00 wine isn't so bad."

"I'm more of a beer girl, myself." She squeezed his arm urgently. "You work on the virus. I'll look for Sugimoto."

Before Gabriel could ask Riley how she planned on accomplishing that without vision, the glow from a cell phone lit up a small section of darkness next to them, illuminating the owner's face. Riley snatched it away and held it up like a flashlight, sweeping it around and lighting up a number of surprised faces.

Clever girl.

As Riley moved into the crowd and flashed her light, Gabriel brought up the power grid's coding, spotting section after section of corrupt execution lines that pulsed at him like wounds. "Nelson? You seeing what I'm seeing?"

"Sure am, brother." There was the audible sound of knuckles cracking. "Pretty sophisticated stuff, but nothing we can't handle."

"Gabriel." Riley's voice was hurried in his ear. "Iwa and his team have Abe secured, and I don't see Sugimoto anywhere. He must have headed for the stairs."

A knot formed in Gabriel's gut as he anticipated her next words.

"I'm going after him."

"Riley – " he began. Gabriel wanted to ask her to wait until he had gotten the power back on so she wouldn't be going alone. Maybe it was because they didn't know who they were really up against, but something about Riley chasing after some yakuza member without backup – with the added disadvantage of wearing high heels and a dress – didn't sit well with him.

But they didn't have the luxury of time.

"Be careful," he finished.

"I will."

Frowning, Gabriel focused back in on the lines of corrupt code. He had to fix this – fast.

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Asahi-dori Avenue  
18:45 EST**

After almost a minute of running down winding staircases to the first floor, Riley burst out into the cool night air and onto a sidewalk brimming with young club-hoppers, all eager to take advantage of Roppongi's entertainment scene. Quickly, she scanned up and down the busy street for something that was bound to stand out against the fishnet stockings, miniskirts and pleather: a man in a tux.

Found him.

"I've got eyes on our guy. He's about a block away, running north towards Roppongi-dori Avenue," she said into her mic. Tossing the borrowed cell phone into her purse and securing it over her shoulder, Riley took off after the Sugimoto-look-alike, dodging around club-goers and wishing she had more practice running in heels.

Hell, Riley wished she was wearing running shoes.

Lillian's voice crackled in her ear. "Stay on him and if you get a clean shot, then take it. Just remember; it's to be non-lethal only."

Legs pumping, Riley knew that clean shot would never come. There were too many people. Her only chance was to catch up to the imposter and take him down before she lost him in the crowd. "Copy that," she breathed.

* * *

**Angel's Bluff, Virginia  
Cyber-Command Cyber Defense Operations Center (C-DOC)  
05:46 EST**

Tapped into a street camera, Lillian watched Riley on a monitor running hard after her target. She was now sprinting east on Roppongi-dori Avenue and despite being spotted by Sugimoto a few moments ago, had narrowed the distance between them considerably. Still, Lillian had a feeling that things were about to get complicated.

Up ahead was a blue and white sign for the subway.

Lillian turned to the closest technician at a computer. "I want to know what subway station they're approaching. Get its cameras on the monitors, and find out when the next train arrives." As the technician went to work, Lillian spotted Jameson a few feet away, conversing on his headset. Catching her eye, the agent wrapped up his sentence and tapped a button at his ear, disconnecting the call. "How's Analysis coming with the ID?" Lillian asked him.

Jameson shook his head. "Still nothing yet, but they're now looking at MO and broadening the nodal points for facial recognition. It's a long shot but if someone really managed to pass off as Sugimoto, then maybe they looked and sounded similar to begin with."

"And we can use Sugimoto as a base to find out who this man really is," Lillian finished, nodding her understanding. "Good. Keep me informed. If Riley loses him and he removes his face prosthetics, discovering his real identity may be the only way we'll find him again."

As if on cue, Riley's voice huffed with exertion over the speakers. "He's taking the stairs down to the subway." Her heels clacked hard and fast against the pavement.

Watching from the street cam, Lillian was just in time to see Sugimoto's dark head of hair disappear down the stairwell. By her estimations, Riley would reach that same point in another seven seconds.

"It's the Hibiya Line of Roppongi Station," the technician reported, typing fast at his keyboard. "Cameras are coming up now. The next train arrives in less than fifteen seconds."

A wall monitor showing multiple street views of Roppongi-dori Avenue flicked over to a number of different angles from inside the subway station. From a ceiling camera, Lillian spotted the yakuza member already halfway down the long flight of stairs, pushing past a group of brightly dressed club hoppers in his hurry to get to the bottom. A moment later, Riley appeared at the top of the stairs, grabbing hold of the railing as she descended.

It was going to be close.

From his computer terminal, Nelson let out a whoop of joy. "Okay, I think that's it!" he exclaimed, scanning the lines of code on his screen. Typing in a command prompt, he let his finger hover over the Enter key. "And God said…let there be light!" He punched the key and three blacked out wall monitors snapped back to life with their bird's eye view of the Hyatt's ballroom. The cams were back up, and so were the lights. Hundreds of guests gave collective looks of relief.

Lillian smiled approvingly. "Good work, you two." Scanning the crowd, it was easy to spot Gabriel as he ran for the exits to back up his partner. His white dress shirt was dotted and splashed with red. It looked a little too much like blood splatter. Lillian focused her attention back on the monitor with the subway cameras, drawn to it by the sound of a horn and screeching wheels.

The subway had arrived.

"Gabriel, Riley just reached the bottom of the stairs and is heading for the turnstile. Do you have eyes on her?" Lillian asked.

There was a pause as he accessed the subway's video surveillance. "Yeah, I see her," he replied, racing through the foyer. "I also see our friend is nearly at the platform. Subway doors are opening, Riley. You've got the tail-end of rush hour coming at you."

On the monitor, a ticket booth camera showed Riley vaulting the turnstile, much to the shock of onlookers. She landed, stumbled in her heels, but pushed on. "I'm almost there!"

It was going to be very close.

"Lillian!"

Turning to the sound of her voice, the Director of Cyber-Com was confronted by Jameson, who had a hand to his headset. He looked pale.

"It's Analysis – they've made an ID, but…" The agent's eyes trailed to Gabriel on the monitors, dashing down the stairs towards the second floor. "It's not good."

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Asahi-dori Avenue  
18:47 JST**

Half focused on watching Riley from a ceiling cam and half focused on the sidewalk in front of him, Gabriel watched as his partner ran onto the platform and straight into the wall of businessmen who'd come off the subway.

"Move! Move!" she yelled, gesturing with her hand and trying to keep her eyes on Sugimoto in the travelling mass of suits. She was a shot of red in a sea of black.

Gabriel dodged around a club-hopper with bright pink hair and candy-cane striped leggings. "He's gone to your right," he told his partner. "Looks like he's heading for the last car on the tracks."

"I see him," she gasped, fighting through the last of the crowd.

About three cars ahead of her, Sugimoto glanced back at Riley then hopped inside the subway. Riley followed suit. Then, just as a bell tolled that the doors were about to close, Sugimoto jumped back onto the platform and sprinted towards the end of it.

"Riley! It's a fake-out!" Gabriel cried. "Get off the subway!"

The doors began to slide shut and Riley leapt out, nearly catching her dress as they closed behind her.

The _hell_ was that imposter doing?

With no one standing in the crossfire, Riley aimed her gun just as the subway began to pull away and Sugimoto reached the end of the platform.

A warning bell went off in Gabriel's head.

"_Freeze!" _Riley yelled.

Without looking back, their assassin leapt off the edge of the platform and onto the tracks. Then disappeared into the tunnel.

Riley lowered her gun, her shoulders slumping with exhaustion. "You have got to be kidding me," she breathed.

Gabriel shook his head in disbelief, feeling a sense of unease in his gut. Something was wrong.

Reaching the end of Asahi-dori Avenue, he cut right. Straight ahead and a few blocks away, Gabriel could just make out the blue and white subway sign. "I'm a minute out," he told his partner. Riley was already running for the end of the platform, preparing to continue the chase. But he didn't want her going in there alone. Not when there weren't any cameras inside the tunnel to help him guide her. Not when his instincts were telling him that trouble was ahead. "Just wait for me, Riley, and –"

"No, Gabriel," Lillian cut in. Her voice sounded strained. "There's been a change of plans. Riley is continuing the mission, but you are going to the nearest hospital. Now."

The news brought Gabriel up short and he came to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk, blinking in disbelief. "_What?" _he exclaimed. Had somebody back in CDOC lost their mind? "Why?!" On the camera, Riley stood frozen in place. There was a look of confused horror on her face, like she had somehow just failed him in some terrible, unforgiveable way. His heart twisted in pain for her. "Riley, I'm fine," Gabriel insisted. "There's nothing – "

Lillian cut in again. "Gabriel, listen to me. Our Analysis department is sure they've identified the yakuza member who's been posing as Daiki Suigmoto, based on facial structure and this particular type of MO. His real name is Yoshinori Miyazaki, and last August police traced the sudden death of a rival yakuza gang leader back to him, even though all they could prove was that he had been holding a glass of champagne the leader drank from before he died. The coroner's report confirmed that the champagne had been laced with tetrodotoxin."

A knot formed in Gabriel's gut as he began to put the pieces together. A dark green bottle from France. A glass being passed to Abe. The taste of wine in his mouth.

"Oh my God…" Riley whispered.

Lillian took a breath, like she was about to rip off a band-aid. "Gabriel – we have reason to believe that you've been poisoned."


	7. No Turning Back

**A/N: I'm sorry this is late! I just got home from a week out of the country and it's been a little nuts around here. I'll try harder to hit my weekly updates going forward. Enjoy!**

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Roppongi Station, Hibiya Line  
18:49 JST**

Riley stood at the edge of the platform, staring at the metal tracks below. She knew she had to jump, knew she had to follow Yoshinori Miyazaki into the tunnel, but simply couldn't move. Her body wouldn't cooperate. It was like her blood had turned into lead within her veins, weighing her down and crushing her from the inside.

Poison.

_Poison._

And it was all her fault. She had failed to protect Gabriel from it.

A thick lump formed in Riley's throat, cutting off her airway. Choking down a lungful of oxygen, she forced herself to focus on a solution instead of the crushing guilt and fear. "Is there an antidote? What does the poison do?"

Lillian's voice was low and to the point. "It's a neurotoxin that causes muscle paralysis. Given that this was an assassination attempt, we have to assume that the concentration of the poison in the wine was extremely high. Nelson's still running some projected numbers, but depending on how much of it Gabriel was exposed to, a rapid onset of symptoms could mean total respiratory arrest inside of twenty minutes. And there is no antidote."

Riley felt the colour drain from her face. She forgot how to breathe.

Oh, God.

Twisting away from the platform to go be with her partner, Riley hadn't even taken a step before Lillian piped up in her ear.

_"_Riley, stop. I know you're worried - we all are - but there's an ambulance on route to take Gabriel to St. Luke's International Hospital. They'll get to him faster than you will, and can put Gabriel on life support if it becomes necessary. What I need you to do right now is apprehend Miyazaki before he gets away."

No..._no..._

Chest constricting painfully tight, Riley squeezed her eyes shut. It went against every part of her training to turn her back on Gabriel now, orders or not. But at the same time, Lillian's plan was sound. She had already covered all the bases and like it or not, there was nothing Riley could do for Gabriel that the paramedics couldn't do better with their equipment and training.

Still, turning her back on Gabriel felt like the worst decision of her life. It hurt. It surprised her how much it hurt to leave him.

Riley swallowed past the lump in her throat. "Copy that." Squeezing the grip of her gun tight in her hand, Riley turned back to the edge of the platform and jumped onto the tracks. She landed hard and into a crouch between the rails, slapping her free hand to the ground to brace herself. The black, rough surface was still warm against her palm. Standing, Riley hurried into the dark abyss of the tunnel. "Gabriel, you're going to be okay. I'll meet you at the hospital as soon as I get this guy."

"Damn it, Riley, wait." Gabriel's voice was tight in her ear and it sounded suspiciously like he was running. "Don't go in there alone. I'm almost - "

"Gabriel, just what the hell do you think you're doing?" Lillian cut in. She sounded angry. Very angry. "You are under orders to stay put so the paramedics can get to you. Chasing down Miyazaki is not only in direct violation of those orders, it's also helping the poison spread faster through your system."

A spiral of anxiety swirled up Riley's throat. "Gabriel, are you _trying _to die?!" she exclaimed. Her voice echoed into the darkness. A deep twilight had set around her as she moved further into the tunnel, making it hard to see. "You have to go to the hospital!"

"And you need backup," he snapped in response. "If I was going to drop dead in twenty minutes, I would have started to feel something by now. I chipped the poison. It could be _hours_ before even the first symptom-"

"Damn it, Gabriel," Riley cut in, yanking the borrowed cell phone from her purse. "I don't care!"

"Riley is perfectly capable of apprehending one, likely unarmed, target by herself," Lillian added. "This poison could kill you, Gabriel. You are _off mission_. Am I making myself clear?"

Holding the cell phone over her raised gun for light, Riley continued into the darkness. "Listen to her, Gabriel," she demanded, sweeping the light in front of her. "Go to the hospital or I swear to God you won't have to worry about the poison because I will kill you myself." From the phone's beam of light, Riley saw a narrow, metal platform that stretched down either side of the tunnel for maintenance crews to walk on. The platforms only stood about a foot off the ground. A sparse number of lamps were mounted high up on the walls, giving off limited amounts of light. Otherwise, the tunnel was empty. There was no sign of Miyazaki anywhere.

"Riley." Gabriel's voice was tight and strained. "I - "

"_Go._" God, why did he have to be such a stubborn pain in her ass? Didn't he care that he could stop breathing and die from suffocation? No. No, she would not let that happen. She would not watch him die. "Gabriel, _please_ go."

In the silence that followed, Riley prayed she had gotten through to him. Specifically, she was hoping that her use of 'please' would strike a chord, since - despite nearly a year of being partners - she had never said that word to him before.

Admittedly it was a cheap trick, but Riley couldn't have cared less.

As she continued her sweep, the dead air was finally broken with Gabriel's slow, frustrated sigh. From the sounds of things, he had stopped moving. "Fine," he growled, sounding anything but. Evidently, he didn't like her tugging at his heartstrings.

Riley let out a breath of relief as some of the crushing weight lifted off her chest. "Thank you," she murmured.

"Thank me in person at the hospital," he answered stiffly. "Ambulance found me. Just...Riley, just promise me you'll be careful. This whole tunnel escape doesn't sit right, and I don't like it."

The fact that Gabriel had just shown concern for her safety for the second time over the course of the evening was not lost on Riley. There was something unsettling about it, especially since he was the one in danger. "I'll be fine. I'm the one with the gun, remember?" Riley strained her eyes as she moved further into the tunnel's darkness, illuminated by the cell phone's beam of light. "Miyazaki's just using the poor visibility as a cover to get away since he didn't lose me with his little subway trick. He seems to like the whole blind exit strategy."

Probably because it worked.

The further Riley moved into the tunnel and away from the bright station lights at her back, the darker it became. Despite the lights on the walls and the phone in her hand, it was nearly as pitch black as the ballroom had been after Miyazaki's virus had cut the power.

"Maybe," Gabriel answered, sounding doubtful. "But I've got a bad feeling that ain't it." In the background were the voices of other men - probably the paramedics. "Keep your - no, no stretcher - keep your eyes open."

"Gabriel, get on the stretcher," Lillian said flatly. "They're trying to lower your blood pressure."

Riley almost smiled, picturing Gabriel waving off the paramedics in annoyance. He was on his way to the hospital. They'd soon know how much poison was in him, and the doctors would keep him alive. Put him on life support if they had to. Gabriel was going to be okay. He was. He _was_. "How're you feeling?" she ventured. "Any symptoms yet?"

Gabriel must have heard the worry in her voice because his tone softened considerably. "I'm fine, Riley. I should be out there with you."

Her heart ached. She wanted so badly to be in the ambulance with him. So badly it hurt. "I'll be at the hospital soon."

"Next subway arrives in three minutes, Riley," Jameson informed her. "How's it coming in there?"

Riley forced herself to focus back on the task at hand. "No sign of our guy yet," she admitted, carefully sweeping her light source as she moved briskly forward. The dank stench of metal and stale air filled her lungs. All she could hear were the echoing clacks of her own heels on the ground and faraway rumblings of other subway lines. "But his only two choices are to keep going towards the next station or double back and - "

An echoing _click_ caught Riley's attention. It had come from somewhere up ahead and she rushed forward to find its source.

"Riley? You okay?" Gabriel's anxious voice was loud over the sirens in the background. The ambulance was on route to the hospital.

"Yeah, I just heard something," she quickly answered. This was it. Her gut was telling her this was it. "I think it was a door closing. Are there any mechanical or utility rooms in this tunnel? Any places Miyazaki could hide?"

"Hang on, I'm accessing the subway blueprints," Gabriel rushed.

Riley moved fast, sweeping the phone back and forth along both the maintenance platforms in search of what could have made the noise.

"Got it. Quarter mile in, there's a small electrical room on the right."

In another moment, Riley spotted a steel door. "I see it." Hopping over the tracks, she stepped up onto the platform and put a hand on the door knob. Gun ready, she paused to take a deep, calming breath.

Time to end this. Gabriel was waiting for her.

Flinging the door open, Riley burst inside. Flashing the light around the room, she saw tiled floor, a small, circular storm drain, a row of blinking electric switchboards that sat along most of the far wall...but no Miyazaki. Hitting the lightswitch, fluorescent lights flicked to life above Riley as she lowered her gun.

"Riley, what's happening?" It was Gabriel.

"Do you have eyes on Miyazaki?" Lillian asked.

Riley frowned in disappointment at the switchboards, feeling like she was missing some piece of a puzzle. "No, the room's clear."

"Then get outta there," Gabriel ordered. "It could be a trap."

Riley's instincts weren't so sure. "That doesn't fit Miyazaki's profile," she explained, stuffing the cell phone back in her purse. "This guy doesn't use the direct approach - he blends into his surroundings and carries out his missions quietly without drawing attention to himself. Then he just slips away."

"Okay," Jameson chimed in. "But he's not in the room. How do you explain that?"

Good question. If she was right and Miyazaki did go into the room, he either had come out the way he came in, or...

A light bulb went off in Riley's head.

"There's more than one exit," she explained, feeling a rush of adrenaline. Adding her gun to her purse, Riley moved to the closest wall and began running her hands along its cool surface. "At the White House there are all kinds of hidden entrances that lead to secret, underground passages the Secret Service uses to move the President around." Finding nothing, she moved to the back wall, roaming her hands over the electric switchboards. "Some of these entrances you can access through revolving bookshelves, or a false wall...some are even trap doors hidden in plain - "

Wait a second.

Riley spun around and stared at the storm drain in the middle of the room, no bigger than her fist. The storm drain. The tiled floor. Hidden in plain sight...

"What is it?" Gabriel asked, anxious for an update.

Bent over the drain, she pried off the grated metal cap and stuck her hand in. Inside, she felt a lever. "My other exit," Riley breathed. She should have noticed it before. Due to the spacing around tiles, it would be impossible to tell if some weren't actually attached together. It was the perfect way to hide a trap door. Pulling on the lever, a rectangular section of the tile in front of her began to raise upwards, like she was lifting up the hood of a car. Riley lifted the section until it was past ninety degrees, then stared down at what had been hiding beneath. "It's a staircase."


	8. Countdown

**AN: A big, big, enormous thank you goes out to kwisteria for all the Japanese translations. I dedicate this chapter to you!**

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
****Gaien-higashi-dori Avenue  
18:53 JST**

Gabriel sat barechested on the edge of the stretcher, gripping its cool, metal frame as the ambulance sped through the night. Sitting on the padded bench across from him, a gloved up paramedic dressed in sky blue medical scrubs breathed carefully through his face mask as he folded Gabriel's stained suit jacket and dress shirt into a sterile bag. The small enclosure smelled of wine and his skin of rubbing alcohol.

"A staircase," Gabriel repeated with a frown. "That wasn't on the blueprints." He shook his head, trying to lock down the knotted sense of dread that was spreading like a cancer in his stomach. He _knew_ Miyazaki's jump into the tunnel hadn't just been a blind exit strategy. Damn it...why couldn't he have been wrong? And what the hell was waiting for Riley down those stairs? Frowning in frustration, Gabriel knew he had to focus and help his partner. Find some blueprints that would actually be useful. "So where do they lead?" he asked. "What're we dealing with here?"

Riley's heels made fast, muted clicks as she made her descent. "Not sure yet. It's hard to see, but it's probably thirty feet to the bottom and I'm already about twenty feet underground. That's the kind of depth you'd need for a nuclear shelter - maybe a military base."

"Good, that gives me a place to start. I'll chip into Japan's Ministry of Defence and see what I can find."

"Uh, Gabriel, I know the chip's state-of-the-art, but even you aren't going to break into their servers," Jameson countered. "Wasn't the Minister for Defence making eyes at Riley earlier in the ballroom? We can get him to log into the servers remotely and - "

"How? He'd need his own laptop to do that. You think he just brought it along to a presidential banquet?" Gabriel spat. "Breaking in's the only way, unless you've got a better idea."

In the air in front of him, he attempted to bring up the MoD network but a security box containing the red words of _NO ACCESS _immediately flashed before his eyes. Sure enough, he'd been firewalled. By a 4096-bit encryption algorithm, no less. Searching for a way around it, Gabriel came across a second security box. _NO ACCESS._

_NO ACCESS._

_NO ACCESS. _

_NO ACCESS._

_NO ACCESS._

_NO ACCESS._

Gabriel let out a huff. "Damn it." He needed that better idea.

As his mind raced to come up with a second solution, the paramedic finished putting Gabriel's wine stained clothes into the sterile bag. Then the man stood and removed the stethoscope from around his neck, fitting in the eartips and pressing the chest piece over Gabriel's heart. "How do you feel?" The paramedic's words were carefully spoken and muffled from behind his facemask. He gestured widely to his own upper body. "You feel numb here?"

Gabriel narrowed his eyes. "No."

The man tapped his own mouth, over the mask. "Here?"

"No."

Pulling down his facemask, the man stuck out his tongue. "Here?"

"_No._" Frustrated, Gabriel pushed the stethoscope away. 'Rapid onset' his ass. "Riley, you at the bottom yet? What's down there?"

As he waited for a response, the paramedic came at him again, this time with a blood pressure cuff. With a look of hesitation, the man moved to strap on the cuff but abruptly stopped when Gabriel shot him a withering glare. Disheartened, he ducked to the front of the ambulance and began speaking in Japanese to the driver. They were probably discussing how best to deal with their upstart patient.

Well, too bad for them.

"Riley, you copy?"

"Yeah, I copy. I'm coming to the bottom now. The stairs, they ended at a door."

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Hibiya Line Underground  
18:55 JST**

Riley's heart pounded against her ribs just slightly more from adrenaline than exertion. A bead of sweat rolled down her temple. Taking slow, deep breaths, she stood to the side of the door with her Sig ready in one hand and reached to test the doorknob with the other. Turning the knob, Riley found that it, like the door to the electrical room, wasn't locked. But no one could tell her this time what lay beyond.

Gabriel's words were low and edged in her ear. "Keep your eyes and ears open," he instructed. "Be ready for anything."

Willing her heart to stop trying to burst from her chest, Riley prepared herself as best she could. "I'm going in," she muttered. Hand on the knob, Riley popped the door open and burst inside, bringing her Sig up and into the Weaver stance. Left arm straight, right arm bent at the elbow, her head moved with the gun, quickly scanning her surroundings.

She was in a room – no, some sort of storage facility. A large, lengthy storage facility that easily stretched out two hundred feet in front of her and boasted aisle after aisle of racks. The racks stood over seven feet tall and ran almost continuously down the space, save for the cross aisles about every twenty feet. The layout turned the entire area into one big grid. Looking closer at what was on the racks, Riley saw hundreds upon hundreds of different sized containers. Some were long and narrow, made of a hard, black plastic. Others looked like industrial-strength briefcases. Still more were made of an army green metal, the size and shape of a computer tower. As varied as they were, however, she didn't have to look in a single one to know what was inside.

Guns. Guns and ammo.

Closing the door behind her, Riley wasted no time hurrying over to the column of racks closest to the wall and crouched down behind a stack of rifle cases for cover. Keeping the wall at her back, she looked through the racks for Miyazaki, praying he hadn't gone in search of something automatic like an AK-47.

So much for her weapon advantage.

"Riley, talk to me. What's happening?" Gabriel asked.

Her stomach flipped. "Remember during the briefing when you said the Yamaguchi clan was into arms deals? That Takayama, their second-in-command, had been implicated in some?" she whispered back.

There was a beat, and his next words were heavy with dread. "The hell did you just walk into...?"

"Their motherload."

"Moushiwake arimasen deshita!"

The sound of a guilt-ridden male voice had Riley snapping her head towards the back of the storage facility, searching out the owner. Miyazaki – it had definitely been him. Staying as low as she could, Riley moved forward, scanning through several rows of leather mutton leg cases and a pair of automatic grenade launchers. Then, from behind a pyramid of grey shotshell boxes, she spotted a familiar looking figure standing in a clearing at the end of the aisles.

Then her heart skipped a beat.

It wasn't Miyazaki.

The man she saw was much older than the one she'd been chasing; probably in his sixties. With an aura of danger around him, the dark blue suit jacket he wore was pulled back just enough for Riley to see the hint of a shoulder holster beneath. He sported a closely buzzed haircut, tinted John Lennon glasses, and a severe pencil mustache that was as downturned as his mouth as he scowled towards the floor.

Only his left eye was open.

A chill went down Riley's spine as she realized why the man looked familiar. "CDOC, this is your lucky day," she whispered. "Kiyoshi Takayama is here."

"The sword guy?!" Nelson chirped.

"Bet it ain't for a social call," Gabriel warned.

"Do you have eyes on Miyazaki?" Lillian asked. "Are they together?"

"Moushiwake arimasen deshita!"

Following Takayama's downwards gaze, Riley could just make out Miyazaki between the cracks of her hiding place. He was on all fours, with his head bent down so low his forehead nearly touched the ground as he groveled at his boss's feet. A wave of revengeful anger rolled through her. "Yeah, I see him. My guess is he's busy apologizing for not managing to kill the Prime Minister."

"Good. Incapacitate them. We'll liaison with the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department and advise of your location. I'm sure they'll be quite happy to arrest those two and seize the weapons."

"Hey, what am I? Chopped liver?" Gabriel snapped. "If they see her before she can take a shot, then it's two against one in a room full of guns and only one known exit. You think they're not gonna shoot to kill just because we can't? Put me back in play, Lillian."

"_No_," Riley whispered harshly, feeling that lump in her throat return. Staying low, she began to slowly creep closer to the men. "That's not even an option. I don't need your help, Gabriel, I need you to _not die._"

Lillian's reply was stern and final. "You are going to that hospital. End of discussion."

As she moved carefully forward, Riley started to plan her attack. Gabriel was right, of course. Having to bring the two men in alive meant she was severely limited in aim, not to mention the fact that her dress wasn't exactly built for a stealth approach - or her heels for a gun fight if things should go wrong. But right now the advantage was on her side. Miyazaki was still in apology mode, babbling on from the floor as Takayama's scowl deepened and his face grew a shade of red. Neither one was paying any attention to their surroundings. If they stayed in those positions until she could get in range, then all of this would quickly be over. She'd first shoot Takayama in the foot and when Miyazaki moved to protect his boss, he'd get one in the leg. Then it would just be a matter disarming Takayama and finding something to tie them up with until the police arrived to take over.

Then...then she could finally go be with Gabriel.

In that moment, however, a flash of movement caught Riley's eye. She went down on one knee, freezing in place behind a tower of grey handgun cases. Heart thumping, Riley slowly, carefully poked her head above the cases and immediately spotted something behind Takayama that threw her entire plan out the window.

Back in the furthest corner of the room, next to a wide set of double doors, was a line up of four wooden crates. Each crate looked big enough to fit a circus pony, and three of the four were already sealed shut. The last one, however, had one of its sides missing and was being stacked up with army green ammo boxes by a group of men. Each had a gun holster at his side.

"CDOC, I've got a problem," she whispered, eying the scene. "Takayama brought six friends along with him and they've been packing up some of the weaponry into crates. There's another set of doors at the end of the room, wide enough for the crates to fit through. I think Takayama's getting ready to transport the guns to an arms deal."

"Riley..." Gabriel's words were slow and dangerous. "Don't you dare move an inch closer."

"For once I agree with Gabriel. Hold your position, Riley. Do _not_ engage," Lillian instructed. "I have Jameson on the phone with the police department's Superintendent-General and he's agreed to send their Organized Crime Control Division to your location. Gather as much intel as you can for them, then exfil back to ground level. The team should be at Hibiya Station in thirty minutes."

Thirty minutes. What would the poison have done to Gabriel by then?

Riley shook the thought from her head. "Copy that. I'll make a recording on the cell phone." Fishing the phone from her purse, she found the video app and hit the red circle to begin recording, noting the little icon of a depleted battery. The power was running low. This was going to be brief. Holding the phone just high enough over the handgun cases to get an image, she was just in time to witness Takayama roughly hauling the Miyazaki to his feet.

"Baka," Takayama spat. His left eye was a slit of burning fury. His mouth was twisted in a sneer of disgust. Hands fisted around the lapels of Miyazaki's suit jacket, he shook the man violently. "_Baka._"

Somebody was in trouble.

Takayama turned to the six men packing the last crate, summoning two. Those men immediately put down the ammo boxes they were holding and hustled over to stand at their boss's side. One wore a simple white T-shirt, revealing his sleeves of intricate tattoos which stopped at his wrists. The other had on a black leather jacket. While Riley aimed the camera at Tattoos and Leather Jacket, Takayama let go of Miyazaki and silently reached for the gun inside his suit jacket. Holding the weapon by the barrel, he reared back his arm and swung.

_CRACK!_

With a cry of pain, Miyazaki crashed to the floor. His hands cupped the right side of his face, but he didn't make another sound. Tattoos and Leather Jacket both stood by, their concerned eyes betraying otherwise expressionless features. Takayama barked a command, and the two men grabbed Miyazaki under the arms, hauling him back to his feet.

For a moment, Riley thought Takayama would strike him again. Instead, he opened up his jacket and holstered his gun. Then he pointed to the door Riley had entered from and barked out a new set of orders. "Onna wo mitsuke ro. Koroshitara modottekoi. Hayakushinai to fune ni noriokureru zo."

Miyazaki, Tattoos, and Leather Jacket all nodded in unison. "Hai!" Then turned and began jogging towards the door. Tattoos and Leather Jacket pulled out their guns. Riley ducked her head, retracting the cell phone and pulling her arms and legs in close behind the tower of handgun cases. She didn't need to understand Japanese to guess what was going on.

Confirming her suspicion, Gabriel spoke low in her ear; his voice edged with tension. "Riley, I hope you found a good place to hide. Takayama just gave the order to find and kill you."

"Yeah, I figured that," she whispered back, listening to the rapidly approaching trio of footsteps from the next aisle over. "But I'm pretty well hidden back here. They're not going to see me."

"Good."

If Gabriel was trying to sound relieved, then he failed miserably.

The footsteps grew closer. In another few moments the men would be past her and heading for the stairs, none the wiser. They'd search down the tunnel after a ghost. Riley squeezed the grip of her Sig. Just a few more seconds.

_Beep beep beep!_

The men came to a dead halt just feet from her and Riley stifled a curse. Staring at the phone in her hand, it flashed its low battery at her. Damn it! The stupid phone had a warning to alert you it was about to die!

"Kikoeta ka?"

"Mukoukara kikoeta zo. Omae wa acchi kara ike. Ore wa hantaigawa kara iku."

Gabriel was fast with a translation. "Riley, they're splitting up to look for whatever made that noise. Get the hell out of there, now!"

Looking towards the door she came in from, Riley spotted Leather Jacket through the racks, coming to block her path. Positioning herself to break into a run, she took aim and fired.

_BANG!_

The bullet caught him in the shoulder. He went down and all hell broke loose.

"_Mitsuketa zo!_"

"Go! Get outta there!" Gabriel ordered.

Amidst the yelling and thunder of footsteps, Riley launched to her feet and sprinted for the door.

_BANG!_

A bullet whizzed by her left ear and she twisted around, still running. She aimed at Tattoos as he used the end of the rack for cover but squeezed the trigger the same moment he twisted away.

_BANG!_

The bullet flew by him, harmless.

Snapping her head back around, Riley had no time to react to Miyazaki standing directly in her path. She ran right into him and they collided hard, the impact knocking them both to the floor. Dazed and hurting, Riley held onto her gun and rolled away from Miyazaki before scrambling to get up. He got up a fraction sooner and lunged to catch her by the arm. Getting to her feet, she saw Tattoos train his gun and sidestepped Miyazaki, swinging her forearm straight for his neck. Before Tattoos could take his next shot, her arm connected with Miyazaki's throat and she hauled him back against her into a choke hold. Locking her forearm across his trachea, she pressed her gun to his temple.

Now she had a shield. And her ticket out of there.

"Drop your weapon!" Riley ordered at Tattoos. She started walking quickly backwards towards her exit, pulling Miyazaki along with her as he gripped her arm. "Drop it or I'll shoot!" Eyes darting around, she saw the other four men hurrying towards her through the aisle. They were spread out in a straight line, with their guns up and pointed. Takayama walked calmly behind. "Stay where you are! All of you!" she commanded.

"Riley, tell me your plan is gonna work." Gabriel's voice was strained with anxiety.

Before she could answer, Takayama sneered and barked an order. Everyone froze in place. Then, he broke through the middle of the line, once again reached into his suit jacket and pulling out his gun. He continued walking forward.

"I said stay back!" Riley pulled Miyazaki along, hurrying backwards towards the door. Almost there. Almost there! "Stay back or I'll kill him!"

It was a bluff, of course, but they didn't need to know that. They just needed to believe her.

Unfortunately, Takayama didn't seem bothered by her threat. Instead, he aimed the gun and glared at her with his one working eye. "You will kill him?" he asked, pulling his lips up into a sneer. "Please, allow me."

_BANG!_

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
****Gaien-higashi-dori Avenue  
19:01 JST**

The sound of a gunshot was deafening in Gabriel's ear. It was followed by the thunder of commotion. Then there was nothing but static.

"Riley?" Gabriel choked out. "_Riley?!"_ Leaping to his feet, he leaned towards the driver and clapped his hand down hard on the man's shoulder. "Turn around!" he barked. "Turn around and go back to Hibiya Station!"

The man tore his eyes from the road, staring in astonishment. "Agent Vaughn - we take you to hospital!"

"Gabriel…no, I can't allow you to do that." Lillian's voice was hollow in his ear. "It's too dangerous. Given the circumstances…we have to assume…"

Lillian didn't finish the sentence, letting the empty silence speak for itself.

"She is _not _dead, Lillian," Gabriel snapped. His voice had an edge of desperation to it as he fought to stay calm. It felt like someone had blown a hole through his chest. "Riley is _not dead._"

The other paramedic grabbed at Gabriel's arm, urging him in broken English to sit back down on the stretcher. Gabriel roughly shook him off. "My partner – the yakuza have her," he rushed. "You have to go back. We have to turn around!"

The driver was adamant, shaking his head vigorously as he stepped harder on the gas. "No, no, Agent Vaughn. Your government said to take you to hospital. We must go there."

"Gabriel, I'm so sorry," Lillian strained. There was a waver in her speech. "The Organized Crime Control Division is twenty-five minutes out. They'll – "

"_No!" _Gabriel pulled out his gun. Aiming it at the driver's temple, the man gasped, his hands clenching the steering wheel. "You've got two options. You can either listen to the American government, or you can listen to the man who's pointing a gun at your head." He cocked the hammer, prepared to do whatever it took. "Turn the ambulance around. _Now_."

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Hibiya Line Underground  
19:02 JST**

Riley stared at Miyazaki's lifeless body crumpled up at her feet. A pool of blood crept across the floor, fed from the hole in his chest. Her earpiece lay in pieces next to him.

"You are probably wondering why I have not yet killed _you_, American." Takayama stood on the other side of Miyazaki's body, waving her confiscated Sig in one hand. Around them, a bleeding Leather Jacket stood with four of the men in a semi circle, aiming their guns at Riley's chest. At her back, Tattoos held her wrists painfully in place.

Riley breathed slowly to temper her racing heart, trying to ignore how the entire scene was reminiscent of an execution by firing squad. All that was missing was the blindfold.

Takayama continued on. "The truth is, you have caused me much trouble. Miyazaki advised me before he…passed on…that you and your associate thwarted his assignment of killing that coward Abe. This grieves me deeply, but now you add – as you Americans say – 'insult to injury', by showing your face in my warehouse. Invading Yamaguchi territory, and shooting at my men. Injuring one of them, and forcing me to kill another." He gestured to Leather Jacket, whose face was twisted in pain as he aimed his gun. The material around his shoulder wound was shiny with blood.

Riley clenched her jaw, glaring back at Takayama in silent defiance.

The yakuza boss clucked his tongue. "If you are here, I can imagine this means the authorities will not be far behind, eager to lay their hands on _my _weapons. Take away what I have spent many years accumulating. Revealing those passages to them which for so long we had kept hidden from their foolish eyes."

His good eye glared at her, full of spite, and Riley got the feeling that he was coming to the end of his rant. He shook the Sig at her, and she couldn't help but wonder if in the end he'd shoot her with it.

"Yes, American, you have caused me much trouble. So much, I no longer feel a simple bullet to your brain would be proper retribution for the damage you have caused. It is too fast. It shows too much…mercy." He glanced down at Miyazaki, dead on the floor, and gave a bitter smile. "No, you will not be shown this kindness."

Riley lifted her chin. She would not be intimidated by his empty threat.

Seeing Riley's reaction, Takayama cackled. Then he moved towards her until he was so close, she could smell stale cigarettes on his breath. "You are brave, American," he whispered, "but I promise you this: before I finally allow you to pass on to the next life, you will be begging your God in Heaven for death."

A chill went down Riley's spine, but she firmly held her ground. He was trying to shake her and she refused to give the son of a bitch any kind of satisfaction. "You don't scare me," she whispered back.

Takayama simply twisted his lips up into a cold, mirthless smile. It was the type of smile that guaranteed misery. "Now if you would be so kind as to excuse my men, they have some explosives to set up." He turned, called out an order, and they immediately dispersed. "We cannot allow anyone to follow us, now can we?

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Hibiya Line Underground  
19:13 JST**

Gabriel thundered down the hidden staircase, trying to ignore the tumbling nausea in his stomach.

Almost there. He was almost there.

Jumping the last few steps, he came to the door and put his ear close; listening for voices, movement, anything. A bead of sweat ran down his bare chest. All he heard was his own heavy breathing. Gabriel gripped his gun, shaking his head. "You'd better be alive in there," he whispered. Swinging the door wide, Gabriel burst in. His gun went out in front of him, ready to shoot any yakuza members that stood in his way. Scanning quickly around, one of the first things he saw was a man's body on the floor. He looked in every direction, searching for Riley and staying in the Weaver stance as he moved further in.

The whole place was quiet. Much too quiet.

"Riley?!" Gabriel called out. His stomach churned in the silence. "Riley, where are you?!"

Coming to stand overtop of the body, he saw that the man was Miyazaki. There was a wide pool of blood coming from his chest, and a nasty looking gash on his face. Crouching down to check his pulse, Gabriel noticed that the torn skin which had been ripped away from his cheek wasn't actually skin at all. It was the liquid latex he'd used to pass off as Daiki Sugimoto.

But he was definitely dead. And next to him lay Riley's broken earpiece.

God, where was she?

Hurrying over to the closest wall, Gabriel started jogging back across the top of the aisles, looking carefully down each one as he passed by. Each section he cleared brought on another churn in his stomach. "Riley!" he called, feeling fingers of desperation inch up his spine. "Damn it, where are you?!"

By the time he got to the last aisle, a sinking reality had set in. His partner wasn't there. Which meant Takayama had taken her with him.

The only question was why.

Gabriel raced towards the back of the warehouse, prepared to go down those double doors Riley had described and find out just where they led. He wasn't going to let those bastards get away. He was going to find them, and when he did, the mission parameters were going out the window.

If a single one of those men had hurt her, he would kill them all.

So wrapped up in his quest, Gabriel didn't notice the hunk of C4 that had been stuck to the double doors until his hand was almost at the knob. Then he saw the wires and the timer as it clicked down.

Six.

Five.

Four.

Eyes wide, Gabriel turned on his heels and began sprinting towards the other exit.

Three.

Two.

One.

_**BOOM!**_


	9. One Hour

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Hibiya Line Underground  
19:15 JST**

Gabriel lay sprawled on his stomach, coughing dust and trying to ignore the aching pain each cough brought on. After being shoved through the air from the blast wave and crashing to the floor, it felt like someone had slammed his chest with a battering ram. Ears ringing, he stiffly pushed himself up to his knees and holstered his gun. This simple movement caused a stretch of stinging pain across his bare back, akin to a sunburn. Throwing a hand over his shoulder, Gabriel's skin felt warm to the touch. Just as he thought: flash burn.

And it stung like a bitch.

Admittedly, though, it could have been worse. Standing up slowly on wobbly legs, Gabriel found himself surrounded by shards of metal and plastic. There were thin lines of blood from shallow cuts on his arms - probably more on his back - but miraculously his flesh hadn't been embedded with flying shrapnel when the room had blown apart. Yes, it could have been _much _worse.

Turning to inspect the damage behind him, Gabriel saw that the explosion had caused a massive cave-in and the back wall was now nothing more than a mountain of rubble. He had expected as much, but that didn't stop him from angrily kicking at the remains of an ammo box by his feet. It went sailing down the room.

Gabriel raked a hand through his hair, causing a small dust cloud as he planned out his next move. Following after Riley was no longer an option. Not that way, at least. Not unless he wanted to first spend hours digging through an avalanche of concrete. Gabriel clenched his jaw as his stomach tumbled. It was time to get out, get a Plan B, and get to his partner before those yakuza bastards put a bullet in her.

Moving stiffly but with driven determination, Gabriel was almost at the exit when he noticed something out of place amongst the debris on the floor. A phone. The screen was smashed, but it looked like the one Riley had snagged as a light source back in the ballroom. Remembering that she had been recording a video in the moments before getting caught, Gabriel snatched the device up. On the video would be the faces of the men who took his partner, and that would in turn help him find where she was. Trying to chip into it, however, brought up nothing but a blank void. The phone wasn't connected to the information grid. Holding down the power button, Gabriel waited impatiently for the device to light up.

Nothing happened.

"Damn it," he murmured. The thing was busted _and _out of juice. He'd have to do this the 'normal people' way, with a card reader and Riley's tablet back in their hotel room.

Pocketing the phone, Gabriel left the room and made his way up the stairs. Minutes later, he was getting stared at by a lineup of businessmen patiently waiting for the next subway as he threw a leg up and climbed back onto the platform. Glancing upwards at the nearest ceiling camera as he hustled towards the turnstiles, Gabriel got the sense that those men weren't the only ones watching. CDOC was watching, too. Lillian in particular was probably half relieved to see him alive and half ready to string him up by his thumbs for cutting off communication and disobeying her yet again.

He gave a long sigh as he hustled past the businessmen. Guess it was time to check in.

Pressing a button on his earpiece while vaulting over one of the turnstiles, Gabriel reconnected himself. The explosion of noise on the other end was immediate.

"What happened?! Where's Riley?!" Lillian barked.

Gabriel headed straight for the stairs, allowing his anger to flood over the twisting of his stomach as he spoke the word. "Gone. Miyazaki's dead, but the rest of the yakuza members had all cleared out by the time I got there. They took Riley with them."

Jameson spoke up in his ear, sounding confused. "Why would they do that?"

Gabriel scowled, rushing past a few more suits with briefcases who barely glanced up from their cell phones. "As an insurance policy. If you're afraid of getting caught, best way to escape is to threaten to kill your hostage. It's what Riley was trying to do before Takayama went and did it for her."

Reaching the steps and taking them two at a time, a nagging feeling in his gut told Gabriel something else was going on. The more he thought about it, the more it just didn't make sense that Takayama would blow up the only route there was to follow _and _take a hostage. That was too much paranoia for someone who was ballsy enough to try and assassinate his country's leader.

The knot of dread he had felt as Riley had chased Miyazaki into the tunnel came back with a vengeance.

"And pursuing them wasn't possible?" Lillian asked.

Imagining the avalanche of concrete, Gabriel shook his head. "Not anymore."

There was a pause. "Very well. Gabriel, get back in the ambulance. You can help us figure out where they've gone while you're on route, and we'll advise the Organized Crime Control Division."

"I'm not getting on the ambulance, I'm going back to the hotel," Gabriel argued, nearing the top of the stairs. "I found the phone Riley was using to make a video before she got caught. If we wanna find out where she is, then I need to see it." Reaching street level, the cool night air was a gentle caress against his burned skin.

"Is there something wrong with the chip?"

Turning in the direction of the Grand Hyatt, Gabriel broke out into a fast jog. "Chip's fine. The phone's battery's just dead. This is the only way."

Lillian sighed. "Then connect in and transfer the file. We can review it together, but as soon as we're done you're going to the hospital."

Hearing the order, Gabriel jogged on in silence. He had other plans in mind.

* * *

**Angel's Bluff, Virginia**  
**Cyber-Command Cyber Defense Operations Center (CDOC)  
06:26 EST**

Lillian stood with her arms crossed, glaring at Gabriel on one of the TV screens that lined the wall. He sat at the desk in his hotel room, shirtless, silently plugging an SD card reader into the tablet.

She was angry with him still. Angry that he had disregarded her orders and gone back to the subway. Back to where he could have been mowed down in a hail of bullets. As relieved as she was to see him alive, now – more than ever – Lillian needed to control her asset before he got himself killed.

"Gabriel? How're you feeling, bud?" Nelson stood close to the screen, studying his friend anxiously. "Is there any numbness or paresthesia on your lips or tongue? Paresthesia – that's the prickling feeling you get like when your arm falls asleep. Any of that?"

Popping the back off the cell, Gabriel's focus was on the SD card as he pulled it out and stuck it in the reader. "No, Nelson."

The scientist breathed a sigh of relief. "Okay, good. That's good," he nodded. "What about in your fingers and toes? Do you have a headache? Dizziness?"

"_No_, Nelson."

On the screen next to Gabriel's own image, the phone video appeared. The video was paused, but so far all they could see were folds of red satin fabric and a corner of floor. As Nelson moved back to stand next to Lillian, Gabriel's face took on an expression of raw determination. "Here we go."

The video began to play and the camera immediately swept up and around, pointing at Takayama as he hauled Miyazaki to his feet. Takayama yelled, looking furious, and soon two men ran in from off screen to join their boss.

Good. The more people they could identify, the better.

"Gabriel, who are they?" Lillian asked.

Gabriel's eyes narrowed as the video rolled on and Miyazaki was struck. "The one with the tattoos is Noboru Ishida. He was just released from jail a few months ago for gun possession. The one next to him in the leather jacket is Hiroshi Sato. No jail time as an adult, but he's got a few B&amp;E's under his belt from when he was a kid."

Coming to stand at Lillian's other side, Jameson watched the video on his tablet and made notes of the names in a text box. "Got it. Let's see who else we get."

On the video, Takayama was barking orders at the three men, pointing his finger straight in front of him. "Onna wo mitsuke ro. Koroshitara modottekoi. Hayakushinai to fune ni noriokureru zo."

"Wait, hang on." Gabriel paused the video, and the image froze just as Miyazaki and his fellow gang members began to turn around. "When Takayama was giving those orders, I was able to translate the first two sentences for Riley – about how they were supposed to find and kill her – but he said the third one too fast for me to catch."

Lillian nodded to Jameson. "Rewind and slow down the audio." Swiping into an editing application, Jameson tapped his finger a few times and the video played again, only slower. "Gabriel, did you get it that time?"

Lillian had barely gotten the words out before Gabriel was on his feet and moving for his suitcase on the bed. He pulled out a navy T-shirt. "Yeah, I got it that time," he growled, yanking it on. "It means 'hurry up, otherwise we'll miss the boat.'"

The news caught Lillian off guard. "The boat?!" she exclaimed.

"The arms deal must not be happening locally," Jameson reasoned, tapping quickly at his tablet. Pausing the video, he brought up a third screen with a satellite image of Tokyo. The city was an oddly shaped finger stretching east to west, with most of its eastern boarder made up by the massive and imposing Tokyo Bay. Nearly 600 square miles in size, it was almost as large and wide as Tokyo itself. Snaking and curling south, it emptied into the Pacific Ocean and connected to a plethora of trade routes. "They must be headed for the bay."

Gabriel threw a bulletproof vest over his head. "There are six ports around the bay but the closest one's Tokyo Port." He pulled the side straps tight around his ribs. "It's no more than eight miles from here and I can get there in twenty minutes."

Lillian felt herself growing frustrated at her broken record routine. "No, Gabriel. Now that we have an idea of where to look, the Organized Crime Control Division can prepare for the arrests and Riley's rescue. Just help us narrow down the search field. How many ships currently docked at Tokyo Port are scheduled to leave in the next few hours?"

Done with the straps, Gabriel slapped his hands on the back of the chair by the desk, gripping it tightly. His face was a mixture of emotion. "Lillian, let me go. You know I'll find her faster than they will."

"How many ships, Gabriel?"

Scowling, he pushed away from the chair and began to pace back and forth in front of the screen, staring angrily into the air. "Four," he spat. "The MOL Emissary is an oil tanker, and the rest are general cargo ships: the OOCL Charleston, the SITC Yantai, and the ESM Silvana. You want me to give you the captains' names, too, or can I go get my partner now?"

Getting hot under the collar, Lillian tried to retain her composure. "This is not up for negotiation. The poison – "

"Has done _jack _so far," he argued, walking a few steps then spinning briskly on his heel. "I thought you said Nelson was running some projected numbers. Didn't they prove I'm not gonna drop dead anytime soon?"

"Uh…" Put on the spot, Nelson stole a nervous glance at Lillian before stepping forwards. Gabriel glared at him, continuing to walk back and forth on the screen. "Actually, those numbers were inconclusive. We know that you were exposed to some amount of the poison both through ingestion and skin absorption. What we don't know is the amount you actually absorbed or the exact concentration of tetrodotoxin in the wine. Without that data, the best I can do without a blood sample is make an educated guess."

Gabriel didn't stop pacing. "So what's your educated guess, then?" he asked with acidic sweetness.

Nelson adjusted his glasses anxiously and looked at his watch. "Time of exposure was…holy geez, forty-five minutes ago." His head snapped up and he looked at Gabriel with concern. "You're _sure _you're okay?"

"_Nelson._"

"All right, all right, take it easy…" Pressing his hands together, Nelson touched the tips of his fingers to his lips, as if in prayer. "At this point we're at the outside range of rapid onset. Given the historical data for delayed onset…" He gave a helpless shrug and looked over his shoulder at Lillian. "Anywhere between fifteen minutes and three hours from now?"

She took a breath. The truth remained that Gabriel was the best chance Riley had. With a timer counting down over his head, however, risking Clockwork when other avenues were available just wasn't the right play. And Riley would agree.

Gabriel, looking as angry and determined as ever, didn't flinch. "I won't need three hours to find her."

"But you _will_ need fifteen minutes to get to the port. More than that, even," Lillian countered. "Gabriel, this is why I can't allow you to go. You are too much at risk."

He moved forward so fast, the sound of his fists pounding down on the desk made her jump. "It's a risk I'm willing to take," he snapped, leaning towards the screen. "I walked away from Riley and let her go down that tunnel alone even though I knew something was wrong. The _least _I get is an hour to make it right."

As Gabriel leaned close and scowled at her, it was then that Lillian saw it. There, in his storming blue eyes, she saw something hiding beneath the revengeful anger and blind determination. Something that even after years of knowing him she couldn't recall seeing before.

Guilt. Guilt and fear.

Lillian took a slow breath as a trill of remorse tugged at her. "Oh, Gabriel…" she murmured.

"Oh my God…" It was Jameson.

She turned to him immediately and saw him staring at his tablet. He must have resumed playing the video at some point, but there wasn't much to see. The camera was pointing straight up at a concrete ceiling. From the tablet's speaker, however, Lillian dimly heard Takayama speaking. "What is it?"

Pressing at his device, Jameson brought up the editing application, swiped up the volume and rewound a number of seconds. Then he looked at Lillian gravely. "The _real _reason they took Riley."

"…American," Takayama's voice sneered from the speaker, "you have caused me much trouble. So much, I no longer feel a simple bullet to your brain would be proper retribution for the damage you have caused. It is too fast. It shows too much…mercy."

Eyes wide, Lillian quickly looked up at Gabriel. He had pulled away from the camera. His anger had turned to shock.

"There's more," Jameson said in a low, hollow voice. "Right before the battery died." Isolating the sound and adjusting the volume to as high as it would go, he forwarded a few seconds and hit play.

"…before I finally allow you to pass on to the next life, you will be begging your God in Heaven for death."

Lillian pressed her fingers to her lips as her heart went into a vice. A chill went down her spine.

So it hadn't been an insurance policy after all. It had been for retribution.

It had been for bloodlust.

There was a crash coming from the wall monitor and Lillian looked to see Gabriel on the screen turning back to face the camera. He must have thrown something because there was now a sizeable dent in the wall behind him. His chest rose and fell rapidly. His fists were clenched. And he looked straight at her with an expression that was dark and murderous.

They exchanged looks and Lillian knew she had all of two seconds before he was out the door. "One hour, Gabriel. You get _one hour_."

Then he was gone.

The connection terminated and Nelson turned from the screen. "I'm just glad Dad decided to take this week off." The scientist buzzed past her, talking to himself. "If he knew what was going on right now, he'd have a freaking heart attack."

Lillian said nothing, staring blankly at the empty monitor. She was thinking of Riley. Thinking of the look on Gabriel's face. How he blamed himself for her capture. Now it turned out that the Japanese mob planned on torturing her to death. Exhaling slowly, Lillian couldn't even begin to imagine what was going through his head. The guilt was probably eating him alive.

"Lillian?" Blinking out of her thoughts, she turned to see Jameson still standing beside her. "Do you think if he runs out of time, Gabriel will stop looking for Riley?"

She watched him for a moment, noting the way his eyebrows knit together. The frown on his lips, and his solemn, worried eyes. He looked…haunted.

Lillian gave a slight shake of her head. "No, I don't," she quietly replied. Then she steeled herself. "Get me the President."

* * *

**Roppongi District, Tokyo  
Grand Hyatt Tokyo Underground Parking Garage  
19:35  
**

Keys in hand, Gabriel jogged towards his SUV, hitting the unlock button on the fob. In the air in front of him, he chipped a street map and watched as the fastest route to Tokyo Port was plotted out before his eyes. According to the map, he could be at the port in closer to fifteen minutes if he floored it the whole way – which he would. "Hang on, Riley," he whispered through grit teeth. Gabriel took a breath, fighting to keep his tumbling emotions under lock and key. "Just hang on."

Reaching the vehicle, his hand was nearly on the door handle when a voice cut through the quiet behind him.

"Gabriel, I'd like a word."

Turning, he saw President Finnegan striding purposefully towards him, flanked by Griffin and Agent Thomas. Gabriel hesitated; his fingers brushing the door handle as a wary feeling washed over him. Did Lillian change her mind? Was Finnegan here to stop him? Glancing at the two Secret Service agents, it was hard to get a read on what was going on. Griffin looked just as tool-ish as ever and Thomas didn't seem to have a clue. Frowning, Gabriel pulled away and met with his country's leader by the front of the vehicle, hoping he'd make it fast. "Sir?"

Squaring off with Gabriel, Finnegan gave him a quick up and down, his expression serious. "The wine that was thrown at you – it was poisoned."

Griffin and Thomas exchanged looks of surprise behind the president, confirming to Gabriel that they hadn't been brought into the loop. "Yes, sir."

"I've been advised that in a matter of hours, maybe even within the hour, this poison will cause your entire body to become paralyzed and you'll suffocate to death unless there's a tube down your throat helping you breath." Finnegan looked him up and down again, as if trying to decide if he believed it. "Is this true?"

Gabriel simply returned his gaze, trying to remain expressionless. Trying to not look impatient to leave. "Yes, but they're just speculating on the time, sir. They don't know."

Finnegan nodded. Then his eyes narrowed and he studied Gabriel closely while speaking his next words. "I've also been advised that Agent Neal's been captured by hostile forces and their plan is to torture and kill her. For the hell of it."

Despite himself, Gabriel sucked in a breath. He immediately felt raw.

"She's been _what?_" Griffin exclaimed. His look of shock quickly rearranged to one of disgust as he glared at Gabriel. "What happened?" he spat. "Were you too busy storming the castle to watch your partner's back?"

The verbal blow hit him so hard, Gabriel actually recoiled. Jaw clenching, a furious anger bubbled up inside of him. His hands snapped closed into fists. "You son of a - "

"Agent Vaughn?" the president sternly interjected, holding out a hand.

Glaring furiously back at Griffin, it took several shuddering breaths for him to calm down enough for his arms to stop shaking. "Yes, sir," Gabriel finally answered. His words were sharp and angry, squeezed out between clenched teeth. "That's their plan."

Finnegan nodded with a measured look. "So if I'm understanding this correctly, Director Strand has allowed you one hour to search for Agent Neal at Tokyo Port and attempt a rescue." He raised an eyebrow, watching Gabriel like a hawk. "And if you don't find her in that time, you'll go to the hospital and let Japan's tac team continue on without you."

Gabriel took another breath, willing his heart rate to slow down. He needed to get out of there _now._ "That's correct, sir."

"And you're going to stick to this agreement."

Gabriel paused as realization dawned on him. Finnegan was testing him. The whole damn thing, all the questions, was a test of his reactions. One which he was currently failing with flying colours. Without breaking eye contact with Finnegan, without so much as blinking, Gabriel took a slow, calming breath and gave a single nod. "I am, sir. One hour and I'm done."

There was probably a special place in hell for people who lied right to the face of the President of the United States, but Gabriel would worry about that later. All he could think of was Riley.

For a few moments, Finnegan said nothing. He simply watched Gabriel in silence, studying him like a seasoned poker player would scan his opponents for tells. Then his eyes narrowed as he made a decision. "Son," he began, "I've learned a lot in the thirty-five years I've been in this business. But you wanna know what skill has been the most valuable?" He turned and looked back at Griffin, nodding him over.

Gabriel tensed as Griffin stepped forward, immediately getting the feeling that he hadn't managed to bump his score up to a passing grade after all. He debated making a break for it. "What's that, sir?"

"Being able to sniff out the bullshit."

_Damn it._

"Sir." Gabriel began to take a slow step backwards. "I'm not – "

"Agent Griffin, you'll be accompanying Agent Vaughn on this search and rescue of his. See to it that he spends not one minute past the hour looking for Agent Neal, then take him straight to St. Luke's International Hospital whether you've found her or not. I understand there's a team of doctors awaiting his arrival."

Griffin frowned at his orders, but nodded obediently. "Yes, sir."

Gabriel shook his head. No, this couldn't be happening. He wasn't being saddled up with a babysitter, and _Griffin_ of all people. "Sir, with all due respect, I don't – "

"Has anyone ever told you you've got more balls than brains?" Finnegan snapped, pointing his finger accusingly. "Given what's at stake here, just consider yourself lucky I'm even allowing you the hour instead of having Agent Griffin haul your reckless ass straight to the hospital."

Gabriel snapped his mouth shut. He couldn't risk pushing the issue. Not this time. Growling, he and Griffin sized each other up. "There's an extra vest in the trunk."

As the two men headed for the car doors, Finnegan followed after the Detail Leader. "One more thing, Agent Griffin." The men came to a stop. "If this poison kicks into action before the hour's up…" he paused, ensuring he had their full attention. "…then take him in."

Anger building, Gabriel swung the driver's side door open and got inside, slamming it behind him. Next to him in the passenger's seat, Griffin did the same.

"You know, I still can't decide if you have a death wish or just something to prove," the agent bit, pulling the seatbelt across his chest. "Either way, I think you're insane."

Gabriel scowled, fastening his own seatbelt and revving up the engine. "All I want is for Riley to get out of this in one piece." With Finnegan and Thomas walking back towards the elevator, he pulled out of the parking spot and floored it towards the exit. "If you don't want that too, then just stay the hell outta my way."

Griffin scoffed, looking out the window. "You think you're so special you're the only one who can find her? Just do me a favour and make sure the poison doesn't start to kill you before the hour's up. I'd rather be looking for Riley than giving you CPR."

Grimacing at that image, Gabriel stopped, realizing that something felt off. Something about his face felt wrong. Sneaking a glance at his ride-along to ensure he wasn't watching, Gabriel brushed his fingers across his mouth and immediately realized what it was.

His lips. They were starting to go numb.


	10. Charleston

**A/N: Friends, I am so sorry this took so long. I literally spent a week doing research before I even typed a word. This chapter turned into such a monster that I actually cut it into thirds. The first third is chapter 10. Chapter 11 is very close to being done, so I'll have it up soon. Please enjoy.**

* * *

**Tokyo Port, Tokyo  
Oi Container Terminal Security Checkpoint  
19:38 JST**

As the truck came to a stop, Riley looked across the trailer at Takayama from her position on the floor and narrowed her eyes at him in the dim lighting. "Where are we?" she demanded.

No sooner were the words out of her mouth that the man standing at her left – the same one who had bound her legs together at the ankles and her arms together at the wrists – bent down and slapped Riley hard across the cheek. Neck snapped from the blow, the entire left side of her face erupted in fire.

"No speaking!" the man barked.

As the other three lackeys standing around her either smirked or snickered, Riley blinked a few times to clear the stars from her eyes. Then, blood beginning to boil, she took a long, deep breath before turning her head and shooting daggers back up at the bastard. Secretly, Riley wondered how he had broken his nose so badly that the cartilage had healed abruptly sideways and was curious to find out if an elbow jab to that long, narrow horse face of his would be enough to break it in the other direction. Maybe not, but she was more than willing to give it a try.

The truck began to move again and the metal floor resumed its rumbling vibrations beneath Riley's outstretched legs. Staring contest over for now, she focusing her attention away from Broken Nose and the burning pain in her cheek and leaned against one of the wooden crates of guns. Stone-faced, Riley resumed the task of figuring out how much further it would be until they got to wherever they were going. Twenty minutes of driving, and still not a clue where they were headed.

No, actually that wasn't true. She did have one clue, but just didn't know what it meant.

_OOCL_

Thinking back, the clue had appeared after the tunnels had led her and the yakuza gang to an underground parking garage of small moving trucks. The trucks were all the mini kind that Japan loved so much, lined up in a neat row and measuring from the bottom of the wheel to the top of the trailer no more than seven feet tall. The cabs themselves barely came to Riley's forehead.

One of the yakuza men had nudged her on the shoulder blade with his gun, prodding Riley towards the back of the first truck in line. Luckily he had stayed behind her as they walked towards the trailer doors so she didn't have to be reminded of all the piercings punched through his face: a gold hoop in one nostril, a spiked titanium barbell through the opposite eyebrow, multiple lip rings, and matching ear plugs that were each the size of quarters. He'd even pierced one of his eyelids. Just the thought of it gave Riley the creeps.

Walking ahead of them, Tattoos had opened the cab door. Picking up a neon orange safety jacket off the seat and proceeding to pull it on, that had been the moment Riley saw her clue. Embroidered in red over the left breast of the jacket had been a brief flash of the letters 'OOCL'. Then Broken Nose had shown up and duct taped her hands behind her back.

But what did it mean? Riley had wracked her brain trying to come up with an acronym that made sense but so far nothing had. She felt sure, though, that those four letters were the key to figuring out where they were taking her.

Unfortunately, the grim reality was that even if the answer did come, Riley wasn't sure if it would be of any help. After all, this wasn't like Mexico. There wasn't a blazing mid afternoon sun in the sky to provide bearings. There was no Hector Villareal trying to trade her for the codes to a satellite, which meant no proof of life video she could leave a clue in, hinting at her location. Most importantly, there was no Gabriel around to uncover that clue and find her.

Focused on Takayama's polished black leather Oxfords, she could practically sense him watching her with that twisted smile on his lips. There was little doubt the crime boss had been using the time in transit to plan her slow, excruciating death. Deciding how best to make her die screaming in agony. No, this wasn't like Mexico at all. Riley was in serious trouble, but despite everything – despite the gravity of her situation and knowledge of her impending torture if she didn't escape – she could still say that it was all for the best.

No Gabriel around meant that he would survive.

Remembering this gave Riley a sense of calming relief and she allowed herself a small, bittersweet smile. By now her partner would be at St. Luke's, getting looked after by a slew of doctors who would figure out how much poison was in his system and take whatever measures were required to keep him alive. Gabriel probably wasn't happy about it. There was no doubt in Riley's mind that he knew something had happened to her, and knowing him he was probably causing trouble for the doctors and trying to help CDOC sort out where she was. Still, her protectee was there, he was safe, and the staff at St. Luke's wouldn't let him die. From the moment Lillian had dumped the news of tetrodotoxin poisoning on her head, it was all Riley had wanted: for Gabriel to get out of this alive.

Even if it meant that she didn't.

Riley gave her head a shake, clearing out the negative thoughts. What kind of defeatist attitude was that? She _would _get out of this alive, and she would walk right into St. Luke's and ask Gabriel if the hospital food in Japan tasted any better than the food back home. Then she'd throw her arms around him.

All Riley had to do was find the right moment to escape.

Glancing around the trailer, it was obvious enough that her current situation was not it. Even though Leather Jacket had been left behind in the garage to tend to the bullet hole she'd blow through his shoulder, the odds still weren't in Riley's favour. Of Takayama's five remaining men, that left Tattoos driving the truck, plus Broken Nose, Piercings, and two other goons, not to mention Takayama himself, all with her in the trailer to deal with. Maybe if she could pop the lid off of one of the crates of guns crammed in there with them without getting caught she'd have at least some glimmer of hope. As it stood, being immobilized and surrounded by five armed adversaries without so much as a nail file to defend herself put her odds of escape on par with spontaneously growing wings. It was all well and good to look for a chance to get out of there, but the reality was that Riley wouldn't be leaving the trailer until Takayama gave the order. And that wouldn't be until they got to wherever they were going.

As if by divine intervention, the truck slowed down to a crawl. A few seconds later, there was a small, rattling jostle as the front wheels hit the lip of something solid and a second rattling jostle moments later as the back wheels caught up. The truck kept crawling forward for a few seconds, then the engine was cut and there was the sound of a door opening and slamming shut. The cab door. Tattoos had gotten out and the sound of his footsteps echoed heavily against the ground as he came towards them.

Riley immediately caught herself. Echoing footsteps? That didn't make any sense.

Tattoos' footfalls came closer then started to become distant as he continued walking past Riley's location in the trailer and further away. Heartbeat quickening in her chest, she rigidly sat and waited on high alert for him to open the back doors of the trailer. The doors, however, didn't open. Stranger still, none of the other men had moved. They all continued to stand just as they were, as if waiting for something else to happen. The sound of Tattoos' footfalls disappeared, replaced with the squeaking of metal doors on their hinges. The doors slammed shut and everything fell into an eerie silence.

Riley's mind raced. Tattoos had driven the truck _into _something.

Glancing at Takayama, he immediately caught her eye and curled his lips up into a cruel, knowing smile. "We have nearly arrived, American," he cooed.

After a few moments of heavy silence, there suddenly came a muted scraping of metal. There was a pause, then all at once, Riley was hit with a sensation that she was moving _up_. Something was lifting them, in the truck, into the air. Warning bells going off in her head, Riley felt herself being raised higher and higher until finally the movement stopped and they started travelling horizontally for several seconds before finally being lowered down.

There was a deafening, clanging _thud_ as they touched ground, jolting everyone in the trailer. Shortly following that came more sounds of scraping metal. Then another few moments of empty silence.

As Riley tried in vain to fit all the pieces together, Takayama looked towards the man at her right and gave a nod. He jumped into action like a spring, finally holstering the gun he'd been fidgeting with the entire ride and practically bouncing to the trailer doors. The man was stick thin, with much more energy than was natural for someone with deep, bruise-like bags beneath his eyes and a gaunt, sickly face. After being slapped, Riley had caught him snickering and had seen hints of brown, decaying teeth. The hallmarks of a meth addict. Kicking at a safety latch on the floor, Meth swung the doors wide and hopped out into the darkness.

Riley stared. It was hard to see beyond the dim lighting of the trailer, but it looked like the truck had been driven into something long and about eight feet wide. Some sort of metal container. As Meth swung open a second set of doors, a salty breeze of cool night air blew in, revealing the world outside.

In an instant, Riley knew something was wrong. Beyond the doors was what looked to her like a white building about twenty feet away, but there was nothing but empty space in those twenty feet. Blinking, it only took Riley a moment to understand why.

They weren't at ground level.

With both sets of doors now swung open into the air, Meth hurried back inside the trailer and ducked behind one of the wooden crates, seconds later producing a bundled up rope ladder in his skinny arms.

Seeing it set off a light bulb in Riley's head and quickened her heartbeat.

This was it. This was the right moment to escape.

Meth bounded off the trailer and began to set up the rope ladder at the edge of the container doors.

Riley began crafting a plan.

If the only way down was by rope ladder, that meant someone would have to free Riley's arms and legs so she could make the climb. The second the tape around her wrists and ankles had been cut would be the second she attacked. With any luck, there would already have been a few men who had climbed down, and it would be easy enough to pick off anyone who tried to climb back up. She could do this. One gun and six bullets was all she needed. It was a plan Gabriel would have approved.

Readying herself for the fight, Riley watched closely as Takayama exited the trailer. Stepping out, he turned back and gave a nod to Broken Nose and Piercings, who immediately grabbed Riley by the arms and hauled her up; dragging her out like a sack of potatoes.

Up ahead, Meth gave the ladder one final tug and began to climb down. His mop of dark hair was the last thing Riley saw of him as he disappeared over the edge.

Takayama stood by the ladder and ran a hand down his suit, patiently watching with a knowing smile as Riley was half carried, half dragged next to him and forced onto her knees. Looking down over the edge, she saw that it was only about an eight foot drop. Meth was already below, fidgeting as he looked up at them. Next to him stood Tattoos, still dressed in the orange safety jacket and a yellow safety helmet. Around them a few more men milled about, dressed in the same jacket and helmet. A crew. From her vantage point, Riley could see water, a dock, and finally all the pieces clicked together as she realized she'd been smuggled onto a container ship.

The new piece of information only slightly changed her escape plans. Riley recalculated and made the fast decision that she was still going through with it. A bead of sweat formed at her temple as she waited; tense and ready to spring into action the moment her bindings were cut. She took a slow breath as her heart hammered in her chest, glancing sideways at Takayama and wondering when he was going to start climbing down.

Any second now and the fight would begin. Any second.

Riley waited, but Takayama didn't start climbing. Instead, he clapped a hand down on her shoulder and leaned his head towards her with a dark smile on his face. "We have arrived," he whispered.

Then he gave her a push.

* * *

**Shinigawa District, Tokyo  
Metropolitan Expressway No. 1  
19:46 JST**

Blasting down the highway, Gabriel veered around a little silver Mitsubishi Mirage, earning himself a disgruntled honk from the twenty-something-year-old driver as he flew past. Coming up fast behind a boxy Toyota Tarago, he veered back in front of the Mirage, missing the Tarago's bumper by inches and continuing to weave around the next vehicle in his way.

Beside him, Griffin's hand was tightly clutching the assist handle above the passenger side window. "Christ, would you slow down a little? You're going to get us killed before we even get there!"

Gabriel narrowed his eyes, in no mood to even consider the request. He was still fuming over having a babysitter forced onto him and refused to do anything that didn't involve figuring out where Riley was, getting her out of harm's way, then loading up that bastard Takayama with bullet holes. Out of sheer spite, Gabriel remained silent and simply pressed his foot down harder on the gas.

On the webcam monitor set into the SUV's dash, Nelson had paused midsentence with his update on how soon the closest satellite would be in position over Tokyo Bay in order to glance nervously between the two men. Then he eyed Gabriel cautiously behind his glasses. "Uh…just how fast are you going, exactly?"

Glancing quickly down at the speedometer, Gabriel noted that the needle was hovering around 97 miles per hour. "Not fast enough," he muttered, cursing the traffic as he swerved abruptly around a taxi. Griffin held on, shooting a dirty look which was patently disregarded. "We're still a few minutes out."

Nelson's brow furrowed and Gabriel prepared to cut the connection, afraid that the scientist may have finally noticed the hint of labored awkwardness to his words and was about to question him on it. Although Gabriel had been valiantly trying to cover it up, there was no denying that the act of speaking had become increasingly difficult as the poison spread. First it had caused Gabriel's lips to go numb, after which the sensation of being stabbed on his lips and tongue by a million tiny needles had slowly come to the forefront. Paresthesia – normally caused by nerve compression – was beginning to set in, turning the formation of sentences into something thick and clumsy. Like trying to talk after getting a cavity filled at the dentist, but with the added sensation of pins and needles. Gabriel had chipped enough about tetrodotoxin to know the tiny little stabs of pain would only continue to spread and worsen until eventually his entire face became one big tingling, prickling mess.

But that was only the beginning. If Gabriel thought talking normally was tricky to fake, he only had to wait until the poison started affecting his arms and legs.

Gabriel gave his head a quick shake, ridding himself of the thought. No. There would be no waiting. He'd find Riley and get her to safety long before it got that bad. Anyone who tried to raise a red flag before that happened - anyone who stood between Gabriel and his partner - would be swiftly dealt with. No one would stop him from getting Riley back, just like no one who hurt her would be shown any mercy.

Poison and presidential orders be damned. He was doing this.

Luckily, the scientist still didn't seem to think anything was amiss. "Okay…" he began again. "So as I was saying, the satellite will be in position in another five minutes but you won't be able to utilize the thermal due to the sheer magnitude of metal on each of these ships. Not even Superman's X-ray vision could see through all that iron. The main deck's all you get."

Gabriel gave a nod, speaking carefully. "I'll take it. Any hits off the traffic cams around the port?"

Nelson frowned. "Not yet. I've got people working on it but we're kind of looking for a needle in a haystack, here. Heck, a needle in a haystack would be an _improvement_. It's a safe assumption that they'll be using a truck, maybe a couple of trucks, to move those crates, but there are still dozens of trucks driving into the port right now. It would be a lot easier if we had a better idea of what to look for."

"And that's if they're even still on the road," Griffin piped up. "You said there were four possible ships they're heading towards and those ships are all for cargo. What if they're already in one of the storage yards? Hell, what if they're already aboard a ship? You know we're going to lose them."

The thought of Riley being tortured to death because he had failed to find her caused the knife that had lodged itself in Gabriel's heart to violently twist in his chest. Gripping the steering wheel, his knuckles went white. "That's not gonna happen. There has to be another way."

"We talked about this, bud." Nelson's voice was heavy with worry and Gabriel refused to look anywhere but the road ahead. "Once they're past security, there aren't enough cameras around to – "

"Wait a second," Gabriel interrupted. His brain jolted with sudden realization and he smacked his hand on the wheel. "_Security._ The port would have checkpoints."

"So?" Griffin shot.

"So…" Nelson began, brows furrowed in concentration as he started to make the connection. "To get through the checkpoint…you'd need some sort of identification. And that identification would be recorded! Gabriel, you're a genius!"

Already chipping into the security database, a list of a dozen names from the past twenty minutes, complete with the time they had been scanned in, appeared before Gabriel's eyes. From there, he started to run background checks.

"We could cross reference those names with known yakuza members," Nelson continued, his voice growing with excitement as he began to furiously type away at his computer. "Any aliases they use, any names that are out of the ordinary…"

"How about a guy that's been dead for the past three years?" Despite the tingling on his lips, Gabriel began to smile as the list of names narrowed down to a single person and time, feeling that sudden rush he always got right before all the dominos fell.

Nelson's eyes widened and his fingers abruptly stopped typing. "Yeah, that'll work."

"So we're either dealing with a zombie or somebody had their identity stolen," Griffin surmised. From the corner of his eye, Gabriel saw Griffin watching him suspiciously. "How'd you do that?"

Ignoring the question, Gabriel noted the ID had been logged at 19:38. Accessing the checkpoint's security footage for that time, he brought it up on the monitor. Nelson disappeared, replaced with a video showing a familiar looking man sitting in the driver's seat of a white mini truck, handing his ID badge towards a guard. He was dressed in an orange safety jacket and wore a yellow safety helmet.

Gabriel's smile turned triumphant as the dominos began to fall. "Look familiar?"

Nelson's voice was a burst of excitement through the speakers. "That's one of the guys Riley took a video of! Noboru Ishida!"

"Bingo." Eyes darting from the road to the monitor, Gabriel froze the video just as Ishida reached back for his badge, exposing four red letters embroidered into the left breast of his jacket. "And now we know where he's going."

Griffin leaned towards the monitor, squinting at the screen. "Does that say 'OOCL'?"

"Sure does." Gabriel was already using the chip to access the truck's GPS. "Stands for 'Orient Overseas Container Line' and there's only one of those leaving port in the next little while. The Charleston." Blowing past a little red Suzuki, Gabriel's heart beat fast in his chest as their destination was set. "Hang on, Riley," he whispered. The words were little more than a breath across his tingling lips. "Just hang on. I'm coming."

* * *

**Oi Container Terminal, Berth 6  
OOCL Charleston, Main Deck  
19:48 JST**

There hadn't even been enough time to gasp. One minute Riley had been looking at the deck eight feet below, and the next it was rushing up to meet her as she fell straight towards it. There had been an audible _snap _when she crashed onto her right side and her shoulder had exploded in pain. The world had spun. She had seen stars. A dictionary's worth of curse words had ran through her head and Riley had clamped her teeth together so hard to keep from screaming, it felt like they would shatter.

The pain, however, was nothing in comparison to Riley's simmering fury. It had steadily built up inside of her like a volcano preparing to explode. It fueled her. Gave her strength. It rivaled even the sharp agony of stabbing knives in her fractured bone.

_Takayama_. That son of a bitch.

Once Riley had gotten herself into a sitting position, Tattoos and Meth had dragging her a few feet away from the ladder, pulling at her broken shoulder and causing lightning bolts of pain. Stewing with anger from her new location, she had watched their boss and the remaining three men leisurely climb down the ladder like they had all the time in the world. The last one, a man whose bare arms were a mass of scars and whose face had one long one trailing from under his left eye to the bottom of his ear, had only just touched down.

Riley stole a glance at the handful of crew members who milled about. They all looked to be Chinese, and it was obvious they were in on, or at least aware of, Takayama's gun smuggling scheme. None of them had given her so much as a look of concern, and she had even seen a few of them exchange words with Tattoos. If the purpose of a cargo ship was to transport big, metal containers filled with everything from fruit and wine to laptops and fridges all around the world, probably the deal was that Takayama got to use a container to transport his guns, and the crew got a cut of the profits.

"Takayama, what is the meaning of this?" The male voice which came from behind Riley was old and raspy. Rough like the grit of sandpaper. It was followed by the sound of footsteps coming towards her.

Standing by the ladder and speaking to Scars, the crime boss turned his head and looked over Riley, heralding someone she couldn't yet see. "Ah, Zau. My old friend. I trust you are well."

A short, squat, older Chinese man dressed in a white captain's uniform walked past Riley and came to stand beside Takayama. Looking down at her like she was some sort of curious oddity, he plucked the cigarette from his mouth and blew out a puff of smoke. "I am well, but would like to know why you have brought a woman aboard my ship. My understanding was that your cargo was not of the breathing kind, hmmm?" Raising his eyebrows in question, he sucked on the cigarette and patiently waited for Takayama to answer.

Riley's anger bubbled dangerously to the surface at the mention of breathing cargo, recalling how Gabriel had listed human trafficking as one of the activities Takayama engaged in. She tried not to imagine young women being trapped inside the same container she'd been in, getting shipped off to be sold into the sex trade. Bound behind her back, Riley's hands curled into fists.

Takayama clasped his own hands solemnly in front of him. "The cargo is as we agreed. I have brought the American here because after this voyage, I am afraid our arrangement and your profit from it will not occur again for some time. We have her meddling to thank for that."

The captain's eyes widened briefly in shock before his weathered face hardened. "That is very disappointing news." He took another drag of his cigarette and the smoke billowed from his nostrils like a dragon. "You have brought her aboard to exact revenge, then, hmmm?"

Watching Riley, Takayama's mouth twisted up in a dark smile. He looked amused by her anger, which only infuriated her more. "You know me well, old friend. In a location which will be the least troublesome to you, of course."

"Of course." The captain paused for a moment in thought, unfazed by Riley's scowl. "The crew's mess room will suit your purposes. You remember it connects to the galley and I have little doubt you will find everything you require in there."

Takayama gave a slight bow of his head. "I am in your debt."

The captain blew out another puff of smoke. "And the body?"

"Shall be sinking to the bottom of the Pacific before we reach Dalian." Takayama clapped a hand on the captain's shoulder, not taking his single working eye off of Riley. "Worry not, old friend. No one will connect this American back to your ship. I would not ask of you this favour without such a guarantee."

The captain considered this briefly. "Very good," he nodded. "Do with her what you will."

Takayama gave a nod and seconds later Riley was being grabbed under the arms and hoisted to her feet. Instantly there was a searing lightning bolt of pain at her shoulder, but she blocked it out; too angry to care. All she could think of was the careless way she'd been pushed from the shipping container. The innocent women sold for the pleasures of others. The lack of hesitation in shooting Miyazaki.

Takayama's respect for life was despicable. _He _was despicable.

In that moment, Riley swore that she would see Takayama rotting in a jail cell so far below the ground, he would never see the sun again.

Just before she was taken away, yakuza boss stepped forward and grabbed Riley roughly under the chin, squeezing his calloused fingers into her jaw bone. "Welcome aboard the Charleston," he breathed. "You will never leave it alive."


	11. Infil and Exfil

**Tokyo Port, Tokyo  
Oi Container Terminal, Berth 6  
19:51 JST**

By the time Gabriel came to a stop near the OOCL Charleston as she floated portside against the dock, he knew almost as much about the ship as her own crew of nineteen. She was battleship grey in colour, save for a wide strip of poppy red running along the waterline and the big red letters of 'OOCL' painted in the middle of her hull. Lit up like a Christmas tree from her sharp bow to her wide, flat stern, the Charleston was a perfectly level 820 feet end to end; about three-quarters the length of the Eiffel Tower. At 104 feet wide, she was built to carry 13 containers across; each one the size of a city bus and carefully lowered onto the ship by the monstrous gantry cranes which lined the dock. The containers themselves were stacked in bays at various heights, some two high, some six high, all up the fore and down the aft of the ship. The only part of the Charleston which stood taller than the containers was her deckhouse; a large, flat, white structure which was located towards the stern and rose eight stories into the air.

They had found the ship. Now they just needed to find Riley.

As if reading Gabriel's mind, Griffin turned to him and cocked an eyebrow. "So what now, cowboy? I don't see that mini truck anywhere."

Ignoring the prickles on his lips as he frowned, Gabriel threw the SUV into park and scanned the area. According to its GPS, they were currently within five feet of the truck's last known location and yet there was nothing to see but row after row of shipping containers. It was as if the vehicle had simply disappeared.

On the monitor, Jameson stood with his arms crossed behind Nelson and pursued his lips. "Is it possible they turned off the GPS once they got to the dock?"

Gabriel shook his head. "No, it would have made more sense to deactivate it _before_ they started driving, not after. And Takayama's too ballsy to think anyone followed him after the stunt he pulled."

"So then what? An alien spacecraft came by and beamed it aboard?" Griffin snapped, oblivious to Gabriel's lispy words. "How does a truck just vanish?"

Making no attempt to hide his aggravated sigh, Gabriel's eyes moved from the metal containers to the huge red and white gantry cranes by the edge of the dock. Remembering how they were connected, the beginnings of an idea took root in his head. "Nelson, you were saying earlier that the satellite wouldn't be able to pick up anything on the ship that wasn't out in the open."

"Yeah, because there's too much metal for the signal to get throu – _oh_." Nelson bolted upright in his chair and smacked his forehead. "Of course! The GPS emits a satellite signal! Put metal between that and the sky and _presto_ – signal's gone!"

Gabriel nodded, figuring that was the answer. Dimly, he could feel the beginnings of a tingling sensation across his face. "And there's no better way of getting a truck full of guns onto a ship than by hiding it in a container and letting a crane move it for you."

Griffin looked incredulous. "So you're telling me Riley's on that ship right now, trapped inside one of those containers?"

"That, or they took her out so the torturing could begin." Eyes narrowing, Gabriel's mood darkened and his hand drifted to his gun. "Either way, if we wanna find out we need to get onto that ship and ask someone real nice."

Jameson looked apprehensive and restlessly tapped a fist against his chin. "You'd better hurry - the ship's scheduled to cast off at any second. I've been in contact with the Organized Crime Control Division and they're still on their way but at this point I don't think they'll reach you before the ship starts leaving port."

Gabriel and Griffin exchanged looks. "Copy that," they chimed.

Exiting the vehicle, the blowing night air smelled of ocean salt and oil as Gabriel walked around to the back of the SUV and popped the trunk.

Griffin stepped out of the car, pulling off his suit jacket and hanging it over the passenger seat before coming around and catching the extra bullet proof vest Gabriel tossed at him. He threw it over his head and started to do up the straps, giving Gabriel a once over. "So you up for this? You do realize that we have less than fifty minutes to sneak onto a ship full of potential hostiles and armed yakuza members, find out where Riley is, rescue her, and then get back off the ship – which will probably be in the middle of the bay by that point - all without getting caught?"

Shutting the trunk door, Gabriel could feel little pinpricks starting at the very tips of his fingers. The ones covering his face were getting worse. "Sounds like a fun night to me," he deadpanned. "Feel free to back out if you're getting cold feet."

The agent scoffed, finished with his vest. "I'm not the one who's been poisoned." Putting his hands on his hips, he stood with the letters of 'USCC' emblazed across his chest and continued to watch Gabriel closely. "Come on, tough guy. Be straight with me. Before we do this I want to hear you say that you're good to go and that I'm not going to be forced into leaving Riley behind."

The knife in Gabriel's heart plunged deeper. It suddenly hurt to breath. Narrowing his eyes, he stared Griffin down and spoke through clenched teeth. "You want me to be straight with you? How 'bout this: Riley is _not _getting left behind. _Got it?_"

The briefest flash of confusion crossed Griffin's face before he raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. "Yeah, yeah, your little 'everybody goes home' rule. I remember." Holding Gabriel's angry gaze, he strummed his fingers waiting for an answer. "Just tell me you're good."

Gabriel let out a slow, hot breath, feeling the prickling of pins and needles from his forehead to chin. Damn, it was annoying. "Yeah, I'm good," he snarled. "Now let's do this."

Spinning on his heels, Gabriel stormed off towards the ship, cursing Griffin's name. That bastard. He had anticipated the Secret Service agent being a problem, but still – the man had some nerve going on now about possibly being 'forced into' leaving Riley behind when he'd been raring to get back into her pants from the moment she'd walked into the hotel. If that asshat didn't get his priorities straight, Gabriel was more than willing to knock them back in place. Or just knock him out. Either option was fine.

Letting out a slow sigh as he flexed his fingers, Gabriel ignored the growing stabs of tiny needles at each tip and focused back on the task at hand. Pressing the button at his ear, he reconnected his comm back to CDOC. "Nelson, that bird in position yet?"

"Yup, ready and waiting for you," Nelson chirped in his ear. "What's the plan?"

Accessing the satellite and switching to thermal, a portion of air in front of Gabriel turned into a dotting of reddish-orange heat signatures. Four of those orange masses were clumped near the deckhouse while another eight walked around in pairs. Most were near the stern of the ship. "No one's near the bow, so that's our point of entry."

Studying the front of the Charleston as he drew closer, the question of how they would get aboard in the absence of stairs was answered when he eyed the mooring lines. There were three thick ropes in all, each running from the tip of the bow all the way to the dock, where they had been tied around their own corresponding dock cleat. The cleats, which looked to Gabriel like wide and short T's, were made of solid metal.

Reaching the edge of the dock, Gabriel knelt down by one of the cleats and ran his hand along the rope. Although his fingertips couldn't feel anything but prickling, it was coarse and rough against the rest of his skin. Not ideal, but it would have to do.

Griffin came to stand on the other side of the cleat and shook his head. "Let me guess. You want to climb up?"

Looking from his position to the top of the bow, Gabriel estimated that the distance was about three stories high. Maybe more. "You see a better way?" he snapped, getting a feel for the rope's tension.

Griffin gave a sigh. Then with a quick glance around, the agent started to unbutton the cuffs of his dress shirt and roll up the sleeves. "You crazy son of a bitch," he muttered. "Let's move."

* * *

**Oi Container Terminal, Berth 6  
OOCL Charleston, G Deck Mess Room  
19:55 JST**

Locked in position, Riley's shoulder was in agony. It hurt to move. Hurt to do anything – including stand perfectly still with her arms tied above her head.

But of course Takayama had planned it that way.

With great pleasure, he had instructed Broken Nose to tie Riley's wrists with rope, then to throw that same rope around the rafters in the mess room ceiling; pulling it so taunt, her heels barely touched the floor. The strain this caused on Riley's arms was tremendous. It brought on an unending title wave of pain and Takayama had stood there, watching her furiously trying to breathe through it, knowing how much it hurt. Knowing a broken humerus wasn't meant to be in that position.

It was like a hot poker of fire that gouged through her arm, screaming for relief.

She had to somehow cut the rope.

After instructing Broken Nose to stand guard in the hallway, Takayama had walked off into the adjoining galley in order to find things to hurt her with and left Riley to wait for his return. The moment he had disappeared, however, Riley had started looking around for something sharp.

The mess room was about half the size of a grade school classroom, with a total of five tables seating four chairs each. Four of the tables were evenly spread throughout the room with one in each corner. At Riley's left was the fifth table, in the center of the room and acting as the rope's anchor. It was close enough to her that she could have stretched her legs and kicked it with her feet, but that would accomplish nothing other than hurt her. The tables were all bolted down to the floor, and any more transference of body weight from Riley's legs to arms would only increase the pain to her shoulder.

Apart from the tables and chairs, there was nothing else in the room. Nothing to help her escape. Grimly, Riley considered the possibility that the best – the only – chance she had would be using whatever Takayama decided to slowly kill her with from the galley. And relying on that as a possibility was about as smart as a prisoner on death row relying on a pardon in the moments before execution.

At that moment, the yakuza boss appeared with a tray of items in his hands. Riley immediately tensed, feeling her heartbeat quicken in her chest when he caught her eye with a dark smile. Walking towards her, Riley looked away; determined to stay in control of her emotions and once again relieved that Gabriel wasn't around. Given what Takayama would have found for himself in the galley, she would have hated her partner to witness the turning of everyday kitchen utensils into weapons of torture.

While Riley was more of the fast food type, Gabriel's kitchen was his sanctuary. It was the place she saw him smile the most, and not with that mischievous half grin he loved to flash her but with a smile that was serene and gentle. On the nights he invited her over for dinner, which had grown more frequent as of late, he would give her that smile as they talked about the day and he chopped vegetables, stirred pots, and added spices. Gabriel relaxed when he cooked. He laughed and playfully stole things away from her whenever she tried to help. Working away in his kitchen made him happy.

Coming around the table, Riley heard rather than saw Takayama set the tray down next to her. There was a district clinking of metal.

This – this would have made Gabriel nauseous.

Setting her teeth and breathing as steady and even as she could, Riley didn't need to remind herself to stay focused. She didn't need to remind herself not to let fear, pain, or impossibility stop her from trying to escape. Her anger was bubbling over that; keeping her senses sharp. It was anger that was going to get her out of this_. _

"As a child I was always fascinated by the English language," Takayama began, keeping his back to her. There came another _ting _of metal. "Your employment of sarcasm, for instance, is not something we Japanese engage in. The same could be said of gross exaggeration; your perchance for description using 'millions' when it is not the case. 'It cost me a million dollars.'" He turned to her and clucked his tongue, as if he was scolding a puppy. "Such unnecessary excessiveness."

Riley inhaled slowly, hotly returning his gaze. Her shoulder continued its silent scream of protest, but she focused away from it, staying sharp.

Takayama continued on, walking in a circle around her and studying Riley the way a butcher would study a slab of meat; deciding which place to cut first. "I spent many years cultivating my knowledge, driven to speak this contradictory, rule-breaking language as naturally as a native. Are you aware that there are over one million words to learn? Fifty years of vocabulary, and there are still some words which elude me to this day."

Completing his circle, Takayama lifted something off the tray and held it in front of Riley's face. It looked like a long, metal fork, but with only two prongs instead of three. Each prong had a narrow, sharp point to it, reminding Riley of the utensil Gabriel had once used to spear the roast he'd made them for dinner.

"I have trouble remembering the name of 'cooking fork'," Takayama admitted, "as I always consider forks to take on the appearance of a trident." His good eye examined the utensil for a moment before focusing on Riley's neck. "It is of little matter, though. Both prongs are sharper than any fork you would find at a place setting. So much better for tearing the flesh."

Riley's heart beat fast as Takayama raised the sharp prongs up and pressed them hard against the base of her throat, nearly puncturing the flesh. Then without warning, he raked the fork down and she sucked in a breath as her skin split apart against the razor sharp talons.

Takayama pulled away to examine the two perfectly spaced lines he'd etched into her. "Yes, so much better, wouldn't you agree?"

Riley said nothing, silently fuming as her skin burned and blood ran down to the neckline of her dress, dying it a deeper shade of red.

She would escape. She _would._

Setting the fork back down, Takayama presented something new to her. "This you call a rolling pin. I selected it because it reminds me of your nation's favourite pastime." Holding onto the handle at one end, Takayama took a step back and Riley felt the air move as he swung it like a bat just inches from her torso.

Knowing what was coming next, fingers of fear crept up Riley's throat and she swallowed, only to discover that her throat was dry.

No, she had to stay sharp. Stay _focused._

Taking a step forward, Takayama pulled his arms back for another swing and Riley grit her teeth, reminding herself to breath. Reminding herself that she was going to see Takayama rotting in jail. See Gabriel again and his peaceful smile.

_WHAM!_

The force of the blow would have knocked Riley to the ground had she not been strung from the ceiling. The rope kept her firmly in place as she propelled sideways, choking back a cry from the slam of pain into the space between her ribs and pelvis bone. Breathing in fast, shaking gasps of air, Riley pressed her lips closed and righted herself. Through a haze of pain, she could already feel massive bruises beginning to form.

This son of a bitch. This _son of a bitch _was going _down._

"Such bravery," Takayama cooed. Holding the rolling pin in one hand, he prodded Riley's bottom ribs with the handle. "I promise the next swing shall be higher, and the next one higher still."

Setting the rolling pin down, he picked up something new. It looked like a metal gavel with short spikes on both ends – the same thing Gabriel hammered steaks with before he cooked them. "Now this kitchen tool…this I am ashamed to admit I cannot recall the name of." Pressing one of the spiked sides against Riley's chin, he cocked an eyebrow and grinned. "Would you be so kind as to remind me?"

Grimacing back at him, with her left side and right shoulder two massive balls of pain, Riley would have rather shoved the thing down Takayama's throat. "Go to hell, you bastard," she spat.

Takayama clucked his tongue again, scolding her. "Your manners are appalling," he commented, lifting the spikes from Riley's chin and raising them to her cheek. "A woman should not speak with such vulgarity."

Without warning, Takayama snapped his wrist and the spikes struck Riley's face. The explosion of pain was like thick needles being rammed against her cheek, leaving behind what were sure to be perfectly lined rows of bleeding welts.

"Ah, yes, now I recall," Takayama said, taking Riley by the chin and examining the damage. "It is a 'meat tenderizer'."

With a raging burst of anger, Riley threw her head down. Forehead connected with nose, and she had the brief satisfaction of hearing a faint _crack_.

Takayama lunged back, with his free hand flying up to stem the blood rushing down over his pencil mustache and onto his lips. There was a pause of silence as he stood there in surprise; blood dripping off his chin and splattering onto the floor.

Riley was breathing hard, simmering with pain and fury. She knew from her training that what she had done was a huge mistake - hostages were never, ever to act in hostility towards their captors – but they were planning on killing her anyway so it wasn't like she had much to lose. She did, however, have everything to gain.

And maybe turning all her pent up anger at him was the way to do it, if she could do it in just the right way.

"I'm done with your damn lecture," Riley snarled. "If I had known you were going to try and torture me with a vocabulary lesson then maybe I would have brought a pillow so I could fall asleep. You're _pathetic._"

She watched Takayama closely, waiting for his surprise to turn into rage. Expecting him to get riled up like he had with Miyazaki when the man had reported his failed mission. If she could manage to get Takayama seeing red, maybe he'd slip up. Maybe he'd make a mistake that she could take advantage of.

It was a long shot. A long, dangerous shot with enormous consequences. But it was _something. _

Yet instead of getting angry, Takayama lips curled up into a smile behind his hand. "Such brave words from one whose life will soon be snuffed out." He started to step backwards towards the exit, still holding her gaze. "Is this pain not enough? Allow me to increase it for you." Opening the door, he summoned Broken Nose inside. The man looked startled by his boss's appearance, and was quick to jump into action once Takayama had given his orders.

Coming at Riley, Broken Nose bent down in front of her and pulled off one of her heels. Foot dangling just inches above the floor, Riley felt a sharp incline of pain as he tossed the shoe aside and her weight shifted partially to her arms.

Oh, God. This was going to hurt.

The knife blades in her shoulder stabbed viciously through her bone as the second shoe came off and Riley was left to dangle in the air. Squeezing her eyes shut, she fought back the scream in her throat as her body's weight bore fully down on her arms. The searing hot pain was incredible. It threatened to swallow her up and Riley fought to shift her weight to just one arm; grasp the rope with her left hand and relieve some of the burden from the right.

As she struggled, Riley heard Takayama openly chuckling. "Consider this the prelude," he told her. "When I return, we shall truly begin."

The door closed and once Riley had managed to clasp the rope with her left hand and shift over as much weight as she could to that arm, the screaming, raging pain lessened just enough for her to force back open her eyes. For a second, all she saw was blotched of darkness. Gasping, trying to make herself stay calm and breath, Riley knew she couldn't hold that position forever. She had to get out of there _now_ before her arm lost its strength and the scream that was hammering against her chest came bursting out and never stopped.

Focus. _Focus!_

Gritting her teeth, Riley glanced around the room and a rush of adrenaline went through her. The place was empty. She was alone.

This was it.

Head turning immediately towards the table, Riley looked down at the tray and saw the cooking fork, the rolling pin, the meat tenderizer, and one more thing: a blowtorch.

A _blowtorch. _

Blinking through a haze of pain, all at once she knew how to escape. It was risky - there was a very real chance that the pain she'd have to endure would cause her to pass out - but it was a risk Riley had to take. If she didn't try, she was dead anyway.

Stay_ focused_, damn it.

Thinking of Gabriel and those little crème brûlée desserts he loved to toast the tops of with his own blowtorch, Riley took one last deep breath and readied herself for the pain ahead.

Then she quickly got to work.


	12. Truths and Lies

**A/N: Sorry for falling behind again in updates, friends. I've been sick, plus softball season started up so the number of nights I have free during the week for writing has dropped from three to two. Hope it was worth the wait and thank you all so much for sticking with me and this story!**

* * *

**Oi Container Terminal, Berth 6  
OOCL Charleston, Main Deck  
20:01 JST**

Gabriel stood hidden at the edge of the shadowed, narrow space between two rows of container bays. His back was pressed against one of the containers and he caught his breath, listening to the whirring sound of the hydraulic winches reeling in the bow's mooring lines and watching the crew who operated the winches on the satellite's thermal feed.

Beside him, Griffin's chest rapidly rose and fell beneath the bulletproof vest. His face shined with sweat. "Try not to cut it so close next time, huh?" he murmured, swiping a hand across his forehead.

Holding back his annoyance, Gabriel sensed his temper fray. "Yeah," he breathed heavily between words, "because your slow ass was my fault."

"Hey, I know you don't like the guy, but try and stay focused," Jameson said in reminder. "What matters is that you managed to get onto the ship without getting caught."

Growling an inaudible response, Gabriel had to admit that Jameson was right. After a tiring three storey traverse up the lines and scramble onto the main deck, there had only been seconds to spare as the crewmen had come walking around from starboard. It was nothing short of a miracle that neither agent had been spotted while dashing portside for cover.

"So we going to stand here all night, or what?" Griffin asked.

Heartbeat fractionally eased back down, Gabriel impatiently drummed his prickling fingers and watched the satellite feed, waiting for the men to finish reeling the lines around the winches and head his way. There were seven crewmembers in all; two at each of the three winches, and the last one standing back like he was supervising the whole operation. Soon enough they'd walk by. And soon enough Gabriel would make his move.

"I'm gonna ask for directions," he replied, resisting the urge to scratch at his skin. It felt like his face was being walked over by thousands of tiny ants.

Griffin gave his head a shake, as if nothing surprised him anymore. "Of course you are."

After what seemed like an eternity, the men finally finished securing the lines and began heading around to the port side in their pairs, with the last one lagging behind and bringing up the rear.

"Here they come," Jameson warned.

Gabriel turned to Griffin. "Get ready," he said quietly. "I'm grabbing the straggler."

The other agent shot Gabriel a warning look, but pulled his gun anyway and got into position. "Just try to be quiet about it, all right?"

Gabriel hunkered down, feeling like a runner at a starting block waiting tensely for the pistol. He noticed his toes were numb. "I've got this."

Within moments, the crewmen began to walk past the container bays, all dressed in the same yellow safety helmet and orange safety jacket. They chatted to each other in Cantonese, animatedly waving their hands about in conversation as they unknowingly passed by, mere feet away from Gabriel's cover.

After another few moments, the last man came into view.

Time to move.

Springing into action, Gabriel shot up from behind, grabbed the man by the wrist, and wrenched his arm up behind his back. Simultaneously, he clamped down on the man's opposite shoulder and hauled him sideways into the space between the bays. Slamming his chest against the container, Gabriel pinning him in place. The entire attack took less than two seconds - too fast for the man to even gasp in surprise.

"You're clear," Jameson breathed in relief. "Everyone else is still walking away."

Looking at the man's face in profile, Gabriel didn't need to run a scan to know who he had grabbed. Not when he was instantly recognizable from Riley's phone video. Noboru Ishida: the one with the tattoos.

Gabriel's heartbeat quickened and immediately a sharp pain erupted at the base of his skull, like a hot poker being stabbed into his brain. "_You,_" he growled dangerously. Holding Ishida firmly in place, he gave Griffin a nod. "Check for a gun."

Aiming his own gun at their hostage, Griffin quickly retrieved a Glock hiding beneath Ishida's safety jacket and shoved it into his waistband against his back. Squinting briefly in concentration at the man, his eyes lit up. "It's the guy from the security footage. The one who was driving the truck."

"Sure is." Gabriel tightened his grip on Ishida, itching to make him give up Riley's location. It felt like he was straining against a leash.

Face pressed against the container, Ishida's eyes were wide as they darted from Gabriel, to Griffin, then to Griffin's gun, pointed at his head. He inhaled sharply to yell for help, and Gabriel didn't hesitate to slam him against the container again, crushing the air from his lungs.

As Ishida coughed for breath and Griffin held his position, Gabriel leaned forward. "Listen up, Ishida, 'cause I'm only gonna say this once. The woman you and your friends captured. I'll give you to the count of five to tell me what you've done with her. Do anything other than tell me _exactly _where she is…" Gabriel pulled on Ishida's twisted arm, producing a gasp of pain, "…and you're not gonna like what I do to you. Got it?"

Griffin glanced over at him, keeping his gun trained on Ishida. "Take it easy, cowboy. We need this guy to talk, not scream."

Gabriel ignored him. "One."

"No English," Ishida wheezed. "I speak no English."

Griffin gave a frustrated sigh and his shoulders slumped. "Oh, _great_," he scowled. "Of _course_ he doesn't understand us."

Unconvinced, Gabriel chipped into Ishida's phone text history and email account to look for proof to the contrary. Immediately he found it. "Don't you lie to me," Gabriel snarled, scanning through what he had uncovered. "Riley. Where is she?"

Ishida looked at them both with a scared, confused expression. "No English!" he pleaded, struggling against Gabriel's hold. "No English!"

Gabriel tightened his grip around Ishida's wrist, straining against the invisible leash. "No more lies," he warned darkly, growing angrier by the second. "Two."

"_Vaughn_." Griffin glanced down at his watch. "We've got half an hour and this ship is damn big. Forget this guy. We grab somebody else and try again."

Gabriel simply twisted Ishida's arm higher up his back, prepared to start breaking bone. "Three."

Griffin gave him a look like he had lost his mind. "What the hell is wrong with you? You want to waste our time on this guy? He _doesn't understand_."

Infuriated, Gabriel shook his head. The quick movement caused the pain at the base of his skull to split around to his temples. "He understands, all right. Tell him, Ishida. Tell him about the emails you send to your American girlfriend, Nicole. How she lives in California and how you ended your last email saying that you'd see her in a couple weeks. You wrote every one of those emails in English." He roughly shook the man's shoulder, feeling like the leash holding him back was about to snap in two. "Tell me where Riley is or Nicole's gonna be seeing your dead body, instead."

There was a moment's pause, then Ishida's frightened eyes began to blink in disbelief. "How...how you know this?"

"Four."

Griffin looked suspicious. "Yeah, how did you know?"

"_Five._"

"Okay, okay!" Ishida squeezed his eyes shut, half a second before Gabriel could wrench his arm up and snap the bone. "Takayama - he take her upstairs. Upstairs to crew mess room. That is all I know. All I know!"

Gabriel sucked in a hot breath. Looking to Griffin, he could hardly see him through a map of the deckhouse, locking onto the blinking location of the mess room. "That's on the G deck - seventh floor." Turning back to Ishida, he flipped the man to face him and grabbed the collar of his safety jacket with both hands. "You'd better pray she doesn't have a scratch on her," Gabriel threatened, "or after Takayama, you're the next one on my list."

Ishida barely had time to look alarmed before Gabriel's fist slammed into his face and he went down for the count.

Still fuming and shaking the sting out of his hand, Gabriel couldn't help noticing how stiff his fingers felt. The tingling had spread to his knuckles. Soon he wouldn't be able to make a fist. Instinctively Gabriel wiggled his fingers in an attempt to bring sensation back, but the movement was futile - just as raking at his face wouldn't stop the sensation of ants crawling over his skin and massaging his temples wouldn't stop the pounding headache.

But none of that mattered. Riley was his only priority, and now he knew where to find her.

About to bring up the thermal satellite feed, Gabriel stopped when he caught Griffin looking at him strangely. "What?" he snapped in aggravation.

Griffin glanced down at Ishida's unconscious form lying crumpled at their feet before shrugging. "Nothing."

Letting out a huff of annoyance, Gabriel chipped into the feed to get an updated idea of where everyone was. From the orange-red masses he saw, there were now only two men standing in the open space between the last container bay and the deckhouse, plus a few more around the back of the ship near the stern. Now that the Charleston was leaving Tokyo Port, Gabriel guessed that most of her crew had gone below deck to the engine room, and the rest had travelled up at the eighth floor navigation deck to assist with navigating out of the busy, congested bay. Luckily for the agents, it meant that their path to Riley was virtually clear.

Gabriel drew his gun anyway. "Let's go." Without waiting, he stepped out of the space between the bays and broke into a run straight for the deckhouse.

It took a few moments, but Griffin appeared at his side, keeping pace. "You got a plan, cowboy?"

"The G deck is the same layout as all the other floors; one long hallway with doors on either side. Mess room's the third door on the right," Gabriel explained. "After we get up there, you get into position outside that door and I'll go through the galley, which is the next room down. The two rooms connect. Hold your position until you hear the fire alarm. That'll be the cue to attack. After Riley's been secured, we ex-fil back to the main deck, get on the closest lifeboat, and get the hell off this ship." Gabriel cast a sideways glance, thinking of the parts of his plan he'd left out. "You got all that?"

Griffin gave a derisive scoff. "Oh, yeah. Piece of cake – in theory. I just hope it actually works."

"It will," Gabriel insisted, clenching his jaw.

The two men continued quickly onwards in silence, hustling down the narrow walkway nestled between rows of containers at their left and nothing but a railing, the dark ocean, and a receding dock to their right. Ahead, the deckhouse loomed closer with every step. Gabriel's eyes drifted to the seventh floor, and it was as if a chain wrapped around his heart, yanking him fervently towards it.

Soon. He'd have her back _soon_.

* * *

**Tokyo Bay, Tokyo  
OOCL Charleston, G Deck Mess Room  
20:06 JST**

Riley was rapidly running out of strength. Her left arm burned from holding onto the rope and supporting the rest of her bodyweight, and her grip was slipping, slick from the nylon and her own perspiration.

She was exhausted. Her arm would be giving out at any moment. But locked securely between her feet was the blowtorch.

"Come on," Riley gasped to herself. "Come on, you can do this."

Getting the damn thing in the first place had been more challenging than she'd anticipated. Keeping her legs hovering above the table long enough to maneuver the device with her toes and pinch it between her feet had done a number on her strength reserves. She had managed to lift it off the table, but her feet were now dangling below her and she was running nearly on fumes.

"Hands. Just lift it to your hands," she breathed.

Riley tried for was seemed like the hundredth time to raise her legs up, but she could barely get them past her waist. It was just too hard using only one arm for support.

Covered in a thin sheen of sweat, she knew she was going to have to add in her right arm to get the job done. It was the only way.

Squeezing her eyes shut, she willed herself not to think about how much it would hurt. "On three," she ordered herself. "Just do it on three."

Riley opened her eyes and took up the rope in her right hand. "One." She clamped her jaw. "Two…" Taking a deep breath, a cry of pain burst from her lips as she used both arms to pull on the rope and she swung her legs up to meet her hands.

Black dots spotting before her eyes and her shoulder screaming in agony, she just managed to grab the blowtorch from between her feet before her legs fell like dead weights back down.

Riley felt lightheaded but she held on, turning the dial with her thumb, and was rewarded with a growing hiss of gas. Depressing the trigger, a small blue flame erupted at the end of the nozzle and she aiming it at the rope. The nylon fibers singed and started melting. She breathed in the acrid smell of burning plastic. To her, it smelled like victory.

Her plan had worked. She was getting out of there. Riley nearly wept with relief.

Soon. She'd be home free _soon_.

* * *

**Tokyo Bay, Tokyo  
OOCL Charleston, Main Deck  
20:08 JST**

Peering around the last container in its row, the two men Gabriel saw chatting between the deckhouse and bay were not part of the Charleston's crew. Standing a stone's throw away with their backs to him, he couldn't scan their faces to figure out who they were, but it was obvious enough from their street clothes and guns that he was spying on two Yamaguchi clan members.

Gabriel looked over at Griffin, standing flush against the container with his gun drawn. "There're two guys at our ten. If we go quiet, they shouldn't see us."

Griffin eyed the twenty feet of open deck that ran from their hiding spot and the door to the deckhouse stairwell. Then he looked back at Gabriel, clearly not impressed. "Shouldn't?"

In response, Gabriel held up his gun. His fingers curled stiffly around the grip. "Come on."

Stepping out into the open, he started to hustle forward, trying to be as soundless as possible as he crossed the distance. Behind him, Gabriel heard Griffin's muffled steps keeping pace. He looked over at the men. Seeing them still talking, completely unaware, caused Gabriel to almost smile. This was going to work.

It was at the halfway point that he started to feel lightheaded.

Less than five feet from the door, the entire world suddenly ripped sideways as Gabriel was slammed with vertigo. Blinking, he tried to continue forward but everything was spinning too fast. He couldn't focus. Couldn't tell if he was even standing straight. Gabriel heard Griffin's whispered curse from behind him and felt rather than saw the agent's hand clamp his arm. Yanked forward, stumbling, and trying to remain upright, Gabriel was hauled through the door and into the stairwell. But Griffin didn't stop there. Barreling through the door that led to the hallway, he dragged Gabriel down the hall before shoving him hard into what looked like a small office. By that time, the vertigo had begun to ebb away and Gabriel spun around just in time to see Griffin slam the door behind them and take position in front of it.

Jaw set, the agent looked Gabriel up and down. His eyes flashed with held back rage. "You've got to be _kidding _me," he practically shouted.

Jameson spoke up, sounding wary. "Everything okay over there…?"

Swallowing a curse, Gabriel tried to blink away the last remnants of dizziness. His tingling fingers barely held onto his gun.

Great. This was just great. Damn his body for betraying him.

From the look on Griffin's face, there was no question that the situation had veered off course and into a brick wall. A brick wall of truth. After all his attempts to avoid it, Gabriel would now find out if Griffin really did care more about his career than the woman he wanted to get into bed with. And as sick and angry as it made him, Gabriel hoped for Riley's sake that he didn't. Otherwise, things were about to get ugly.

Going toe to toe with Griffin, he stared the man down and issued a threatening demand. "Let's go."

Griffin didn't move. He barely even blinked. "How long's it been?" he snarled. "How long since the poison started to mess with you?"

Nelson's voice was next, sounding alarmed. "Gabriel, what's he talking – "

Immediately disconnecting himself from CDOC, every muscle in Gabriel's body tensed as he leaned forward into Griffin's space. "I said let's go," he repeated a low voice.

Griffin cocked an eyebrow. "You want to go?" he asked menacingly, pointing an accusing finger. "Maybe you weren't paying attention back there, but our cover was almost blown because you nearly fell over. Hell, you couldn't even walk straight."

Gabriel took a long, slow, hot breath. The headache searing across his skull was starting to feel like his brain was on fire. "I can handle it."

"You can 'handle' it?!" Griffin gave him a hard shove and Gabriel stumbled back a pace, still not entirely steady on his feet. "What happens next? You going to handle not being able to walk at all?! Damn it, Vaughn. Riley's six floors up and you've been lying to me this whole time!" Letting out a furious sound of frustration, he raked a hand through his hair._ "God damn it!_"

Anger welling up inside him, Gabriel's fists began to shake. "Don't even – "

"_Vaughn_." Griffin's raging expression shifted into a look of infuriated resignation. "You heard what Finnegan said. You knew what would happen if that damn poison..." He shook his head, as if he couldn't believe his own words. "I have my orders. We have to abor – "

_POW!_

Griffin fell back against the door, eyes wide as he cupped a hand over his jaw. Gabriel lunged forward for the knockout, but Griffin moved fast. Ducking down, he threw himself at Gabriel's torso in a tackle. Falling hard, air exploded from Gabriel's lungs as he slammed to the floor. Griffin rolled away immediately, getting to his feet. Gabriel did the same. In an instant, both men were standing with their weapon pointed at the other.

"Have you lost your God damn mind?!" Griffin shouted. "Put the gun down!"

Gabriel gave a curt shake of his head, holding onto the gun with both hands as the throbbing pain in his skull furiously pounded away. "Not happening. Not until you move."

Griffin held his position in front of the door. "You know I can't do that."

"Can't or won't?" Gabriel challenged, taking a step forward. "'Cause from where I'm standing, you're choosing to follow orders and protect your career over another person's life_._ _Riley's _life. To me, that ain't a choice. That ain't even an option."

A brief flicker of hesitation crossed Griffin's eyes. Then it was gone. "You think I_ want_ to leave her? Like this decision's easy for me?"

Gabriel tightened his hands around his Sig, finding it difficult to hold. "I don't give a damn what you want. I'm getting my partner back and you're not gonna stop me."

"The poison will stop you," Griffin insisted. "It's already started."

"I don't care."

"You should! Christ, are you even listening to yourself? You're not Superman! You're not invincible! You're just a guy who's too stupid to see his own limitations."

"The only thing I see is a guy who's gonna get shot if he doesn't get outta my way."

For a moment, Griffin was taken aback. "You self-righteous idiot!" he barked. "Would you get your head out of your ass for one second and listen to me? This poison's made you a liability. We try and rescue Riley, and she won't be safe around you. You'll slow us down get her killed. Get all of us killed! If you'd just told me the truth on the dock, I would have left you there and rescued her myself. Now either way she's dead." Griffin glared at him with bitterness and resentment in his eyes. "She's dead and it's _your fault._"

Gabriel froze at the words. For a moment, he couldn't move. Couldn't breathe. His stomach twisted into knots. It felt like a hole had been blown through his chest, leaving behind a gaping, bleeding wound where his heart used to be.

Your fault.

_Your fault._

"I know." Gabriel's voice sounded strained and foreign in his ear, like his words were being spoken by someone else. Someone he didn't recognize. "I know it's my fault. That's why I have to do this."

In a heartbeat, the room was plunged into silence. Gabriel stood motionless, watching Griffin's expression change from anger, to disbelief, then finally realization.

"You've got to be kidding me," the agent mumbled, slowly lowering his gun.

All at once, the silence was broken by a loud crackle from the room's intercom, followed quickly by a booming voice. "America-jin ga nigeta zo. Imasugu mitsukedase!"

Using the chip to translate the words, Gabriel's heart nearly leapt out of his chest. It was as if someone had hooked up a defibrillator and shocked him. "_Riley._"

"What?" Griffin demanded, immediately on high alert. "You understood that?"

Gabriel was already on the move, pushing past Griffin and reaching for the door. "She's escaped! Those were orders to go find her."

"_What?!_"

Swinging the door wide, Gabriel saw the hallway was empty. "We need to split up. Take that set of stairs and I'll take this one." He pointed at the exit door Griffin had dragged him through before running in the opposite direction towards the far exit. "She'll be coming down one of them for the lifeboats."

"No. No, forget it," Griffin ordered, starting to chase after him. "You're too much of a liability. Just stay here and let me handle this."

Gabriel didn't stop. "Like hell, I will. These guys have guns, remember? I'm not gonna sit around and wait for her to get shot."

"Vaughn, quit being an idiot! You think I want this to end with you dead and Riley never forgiving me for it?"

Reaching the exit door for the stairs, Gabriel put a hand on the knob and readied his gun. "The last time she and I spoke, I was on my way to the hospital. Who do you think she's gonna hate more?" Bursting into the stairwell, he heard Griffin yelling after him.

"_Damn it, Vaughn!"_


	13. Reunion

**A/N: WRITER'S BLOCK IS THE DEVIL. THE DEVIL! *cries inconsolably*  
**

* * *

**Tokyo Bay, Tokyo  
OOCL Charleston, East Stairwell  
20:11 JST**

Riley's bare feet slapped hard against the metal stairs as she made her fast descent. She needed to hurry. Needed to move faster. No Japanese was necessary to know that Takayama's booming announcement had been about her.

She was being hunted.

Instinctively, Riley brought her searing right arm closer to her body, while her left hand tightened its grip around the steak knife she'd grabbed from the galley. Armed only with this for protection while up against men with guns, she once again cursed her dress and inability to stash more weapons in a waistband. But it was better than nothing, given the circumstances.

Touching down on the E deck landing, all was silent save for her heavy breathing and pounding steps. Encouraged but still ready for impending danger, Riley wasn't willing to bet she'd make it all the way down the remaining four flights without getting spotted.

How much longer would her luck hold out?

She was rounding the banister at the landing between the E and D deck when her question was answered. The door leading from the stairwell to the D deck corridor flew open and her eyes locked with the sleepless ones of gaunt, skittish Meth.

Had she been wearing a vest and not had a broken arm, Riley would have risked a knife versus gun fight right there. Had she even been several feet closer, close enough for her weapon to easily slash the man's veined throat, she would have likely won the encounter. But at that moment, given the scenario, not even Gabriel would have chanced it. It took her a half second to decide what to do, and Riley was already turning to run back up the stairs as Meth shouted in surprise and raised his gun to shoot.

* * *

**Tokyo Bay, Tokyo  
OOCL Charleston, West Stairwell  
20:12 JST**

Head pounding and hands rapidly losing dexterity from the growing paralysis, Gabriel took the stairwell two steps at a time, eyes focused on each door as he came towards it. Chipped into the Charleston's wi-fi, it was like seeing thousands of shining stars, tiny as pinpricks, outlining the rooms beyond and giving them shape. It was just the way he remembered it when he'd first used Nelson's little sonar trick, saving Troy from the three Russian terrorists. This time, however, Gabriel didn't yet see any signs of life - his partner's or otherwise.

"Damn it, Riley, where the hell are you?!" he muttered, racing past the entryway for the C deck.

In answer, he heard the muffled but unmistakable crack of a gunshot coming from somewhere above him.

Stomach lurching, Gabriel flung himself up the stairs with a burst of energy that had him in front of the door to the D deck only moments later. One X-ray glance at the empty hallway, and he knew to keep going. It was as he climbed towards the next floor that he found the source of noise; two glowing figured locked in struggle beyond the E deck door.

Ripping the door open, Gabriel first saw Riley pinned against the hallway wall by a skeleton in clothing. With one hand she was struggling to wrench away the forearm he had braced across her chest. With the other, she held tightly onto the man's wrist, arm shaking with effort to keep him from stabbing her with the knife he held pointed at her throat. There was a bullet hole in the wall near Riley's shoulder, left there by a gun lying abandoned on the floor.

Gabriel didn't hesitate. His own gun went up almost of its own accord and his finger squeezed the trigger out of pure, raw instinct.

_Bang! _

The skeleton's dark head jerked sideways from the impact of Gabriel's well-aimed bullet to his brain.

As the body crashed to the floor, Riley spun, eyes wide and hand clamped over her right shoulder, looking to discover who had come to her rescue. She visibly jumped when she saw Gabriel rushing towards her. He might as well have been a ghost from the shade of white her face turned.

"_Gabriel?!_"

Reaching his partner, the momentary surge of relief that flooded him came to a jarring halt. Fury immediately began to rise up his throat when he saw how tightly she was holding onto her right arm, clearly trying to keep it in place. Taking in the bleeding damage to Riley's cheek and chest, his mouth pressed hard into a thin, white line. There was as much pain as there was surprise on her pale features, and the cords in his neck tightened at the thought of what had been done to her.

Without speaking, Gabriel reached one hand around to cradle the back of Riley's head and pulled her half against him, pressing his tingling cheek to her forehead as his heart hammered through his vest against her own.

"You're hurt," he said roughly.

If she heard him, Riley made no response. Putting a hand on his chest, she pushed him back to get a good look at his face; her own mirrored the bewilderment in her voice. "Are you okay?! What're you doing here?"

Quelling his anger, Gabriel chose to answer the second question. "I'm getting you off this ship."

With hands that were stiff to the wrists and growing dangerously useless, Gabriel managed to snatch the abandoned gun from the floor. "Griffin's here, too," he explained, handing the weapon to Riley and trying not to overanalyze her look of surprise. "We split up but he should be in the other stairwell." He then took the knife from the dead man's grasp and fumbled a little too long trying to stick it in the waistband of his dress pants.

Riley watched him; her expression growing with alarm. Knowing he had neither the time nor desire to fully explain, Gabriel focused instead on figuring out if the exit that would lead them to Griffin was safe to use. Looking towards the door and using the wi-fi to see beyond, he spotted a trio of men coming down the stairs; no doubt tipped off from the sound of shots fired. Putting a hand at Riley's back, he steered her in the other direction. "We've gotta move."

Bursting into the stairwell he had just come from, Gabriel could already feel Riley's eyes boring into him as he led the way down the stairs.

"What the hell is going on?" she demanded, her heated voice laced with concern. "Griffin never would have left the president after that attack. Not unless Finnegan thought there was good reason to."

"We'll go down a flight and cut across the D deck," Gabriel explained, ignoring Riley's question. "Griffin'll still be on the lower levels, so I'll be able to – "

"Gabriel," Riley cut in. Her increasingly worried tone took on a very real undercurrent of fear. "Stop dodging my questions and answer me. Tell me you're not the reason Finnegan sent Griffin. Tell me you went to the hospital like I asked and it wasn't as bad as we thought."

There was nothing but the sound of footsteps as they came towards the door for the D deck. As they reached it, Riley became increasingly agitated. "Tell me," she both ordered and pleaded. "God, Gabriel, tell me the doctors said you're okay."

It was the waver in her voice that killed him. He had been prepared for anger, but hearing how terrified Riley was for his wellbeing was too much for Gabriel to bear.

Against his better judgment, he came to a stop at the bottom of the steps and turned to his partner. Standing above him on the stairs, she glared down with eyes that burned emerald flames and a bloodless face, made all the more striking by her scarlet wounds.

"Riley, look at me," Gabriel ordered, spreading his arms wide in challenge and ignoring Griffin's accusing voice in his head. "Do I look like I'm gonna die from this?"

The moment Gabriel's focus shifted off of Riley's safety, the poison's effects came slamming back to the forefront. He was blasted with the migraine that threatened to split his head apart. The prickling needles that stabbed across his face and crept down his neck. The gun in his hand felt heavy in his weak grasp as the numbness spread past his wrists and up his arms. There was the vertigo that had left his brain foggy and stomach queasy. And now that he was allowing himself to think about it, Gabriel was fairly certain that he could no longer feel his toes.

But he wasn't going to be a liability. He wasn't going to let the poison put Riley's life in danger. They were almost home free and whatever it took, he was going to get her off the ship alive.

Riley watched him; studying him so intensely, he thought his partner might just see the poison itself as it steadily did its damage. Might just see all the lies he had told and lines he had crossed to get to her. Might just see his soul, and all the secrets it concealed.

Finally, their eyes met and the pain he saw in hers crushed at his heart.

"You'd better not die," Riley whispered, with a voice that was as threatening as it was trembling.

In that moment, the door behind Gabriel opened and he spun to see a crewman with a shotgun emerge. Startled, the man lurched back and snapped his gun up. Gabriel was faster. With a hard chop, he knocked the gun's long barrel to the side and stepping forward, hammered the man in the temple with his elbow before the trigger could be pulled. It was a smooth, seamless move that had the crewman dazed and half conscious on the floor a moment later.

Gabriel picked up the weapon by the strap and swung it around his chest so that the gun hung securely down his back. Turning to Riley, it was then that he felt a sharp pang, just below his ribs.

"Come on," he said, nodding towards the exit.

Game face on, she eyed Gabriel's newest acquisition while stepping over the fallen man and through the door being held open for her. "Any guesses why the _crew_ is armed?"

"The Charleston's got a few routes that take it past Somalia. My bet is the guns are for pirate attacks." Listening, he could hear the sound of rapid footsteps echoing up to them. "Go, go," he urged, following Riley through the doorway.

Racing down the hall, Gabriel's X-ray vision caught sight of the three men coming down the stairs – the same ones he'd seen earlier. They hadn't stopped for long at the floor above. Cursing, he spotted an available room, caught Riley around the waist and pulled her inside.

"We're surrounded," Gabriel explained, locking the door and searching around for what he needed.

Based on the pool table set up in the middle of the floor and a couch aimed at a large screen TV mounted on the side wall, it was easy to guess he had holed them up in the crew's rec room.

"What do we do?" Riley asked. "We start shooting and the whole ship will know where to find us."

"Which is why we're not gonna shoot." Looking at the TV, Gabriel's eyes fell to the tangled nest of wires and haphazard collection of gaming consoles and controllers stacked onto the shoddy looking entertainment system below it. It was there that he spotted a workable solution to his problem; an extremely long coil of satellite cable, running from the back of the TV to a satellite box being used as a coaster for a PlayStation 4. Holstering his gun and moving for the pool table, he nodded at the flat screen. "Unhook the satellite cable and bring it over here."

While Riley busied herself with unscrewing the cable from the back of the television, Gabriel crouched down to inspect the legs of the pool table. As he expected, all four had been bolted to the floor to prevent sliding in the event of a storm. It was the perfect leverage for what they were about to do.

Just then came the sound of voices in the hallway; angry men bent on finding their escapee.

Standing fast, Gabriel felt a second pang in his chest, accompanied by a stomach roll. Shaking it off, he focused on the window straight ahead, trying to estimate how long it would take his partner to climb down three stories.

Juggling her gun and the long length of cable in her left arm, Riley's focused expression turned to one of realization as she joined him and followed his gaze. "This is your plan?" she asked in alarm. "Gabriel, no. You can barely bend your fingers. If you try to climb down, you'll lose your grip and fall."

"I'm not gonna fall."

The voices in the hallway grew louder. Gabriel looked back towards the door and used the chip to see five men conducting searches of the rooms, closing in on their own.

They needed to hurry.

Working out the logistics, Gabriel began feeling off balance ushering his partner towards the window. "Once you're in position, wrap the cable around your leg a couple times to shift the weight off your left arm. Pinch it between your feet and that'll control your descent." Pushing open the window, he made sure Riley was holding onto an end before taking the coil and dropping it into the night air. "Just keep the balance of weight in your legs and you'll make it down fine."

"I know what the S-wrap is," she snapped, growing angry. "And I don't care how many times you've done it before. You're not doing it now, and I am not leaving you."

Still feeling off, Gabriel gave his pounding head a shake. "Riley. _Go_."

"Forget it."

Bending down, she began to tie the cable end around the closest pool table leg. "Get behind the couch. When they come in, they'll see the cable, assume we went out the window, and head downstairs."

There was a rattle at the door. Cursing, Gabriel knew they only had seconds remaining. Time was almost up. "Fine. We're doing it your way," he conceded.

It was as he was moving to take cover behind the couch that his skewed sense of balance started overriding his senses. Dizzy, he stumbled and reached for the pool table, determined to stay upright.

"Gabriel?!" he heard Riley exclaim.

He heard her running to him, felt her hand gripping his arm, but he was already falling. The last thing he heard was sound of the door bursting open as he cracked his head off the pool table and everything went black.


	14. Sacrifice

**A/N: This is the second-last chapter, friends. Get ready.**

* * *

**Tokyo Bay, Tokyo**  
**OOCL Charleston, G Deck Mess Room**  
**20:23 JST**

Riley sat in tense silence. Wordlessly, she watched as the mutilated man she'd dubbed Scars bound her partner's ankles to the chair he and his cronies had dumped him in. She watched as the rope was wrapped and wrapped, each loop like a prison sentence around one leg then the other, before being finished off in a tight knot.

Gabriel remained motionless through it all, oblivious in his unconsciousness, even as Scars stood and tugged at the knots tied at his wrists. Even when the man grabbed a fistful of Gabriel's hair and wrenched his slumped head up to check for signs of life.

"Let go of him," Riley snarled, straining against the ropes that dug into her own wrists. The movement aggravated her searing shoulder but she fought anyway; angry red friction burns already beginning to encircle her skin.

Scars looked over at her, bemused. Releasing Gabriel, he crossed the few feet of distance between them and came to stand right in front of her, blocking out all view of her partner. He stood there a moment, taking Riley in with appreciative eyes, before noticing something on her upper right arm. An expression that Riley didn't dare try to comprehend crossed his features and he reached out a hand marked with thin, white lines towards her. Much like his arms, it looked like his flesh had been used as a cutting board.

Scars's fingers brushed almost reverently across her bullet wound scar - the one she had gotten on her very first mission with Gabriel - and he gave Riley a crooked smile, as if this ragged line of tissue somehow connected them. She glared up at him in anger, disgusted by the thought of bonding over battle wounds.

Breaking away from her heated gaze, he looked first to where Takayama stood giving orders to Piercings and Broken Nose, then to the center table at Riley's left, with its collection of kitchen items, Gabriel's bulletproof vest, and their confiscated weapons; this time all too far away for her to reach.

Once more meeting her eyes, Scars's crooked smile grew, stretching the scar tissue on his face, which trailed like the elevated plains of a mountain range across his cheek. "When Takayama-san finished, he will die," Scars said, pronouncing the words carefully in a thick accent as he nodded back at Gabriel. "What happen to him now make no difference." Then eying her in a way that sent a chill down her spine, he added, "What happen to _you_ make no difference either."

He then walked away, leaving Riley to her thoughts and a clear view of her ailing partner. Twinges of fear and worry erupted in her stomach as she looked at him, knowing Gabriel's condition was rapidly getting worse. In the time it took Takayama's remaining men to lug him back up to the mess room, his skin had taken on a greyish tinge and a sweat had broken out across his body. Anxiously, she watched his chest as it expanded and contracted at regular intervals beneath his T-shirt. At least he still seemed to be breathing normally, but Riley could only guess at how much longer that would last.

She took in a shaking breath, thinking of how badly Gabriel needed a hospital. Thinking of the daunting task ahead. She had to get him off the ship as fast as possible, or else he would either die from the poison or Takayama - whichever managed to kill him first.

Riley had been thinking the situation over from every possible angle, running every possible escape scenario through her head, and had come to only one solid conclusion: she needed Griffin. And if he was captured or already dead, then so was Gabriel.

It was that single reality which terrified Riley more than she imagined was possible.

So wrapped up in her thoughts, she didn't notice when her partner began to stir until he was gingerly lifting his head and looking at her through a haze of half-awake confusion.

"Riley?" he slowly asked. It took only an instant longer for Gabriel's brain to cut through the fog. His glassy, slitted eyes burst with blue clarity and he jerked up with unsteady alarm. "Riley," he said again, this time with urgency as he visually checked her over. "You okay?"

Riley blinked in astonishment. "Am I okay?" she hissed, riding the sudden wave of anger in order to keep from drowning in fear. "My protectee has been poisoned, was dumb enough to try and rescue me, suddenly collapsed without warning, was almost shot, and now is tied up in a room with Japanese mobsters who only kept him alive so they could torture him for information first. You want to know if I'm _okay_?" She swallowed thickly and prayed her voice wouldn't catch. "No, Gabriel. I'm _not_."

As he sucked in a slow breath, Riley nearly took back her words as the tight look of pain across his features and somber look of repentance in Gabriel's eyes threatened to break her heart. Opening his mouth to speak, whatever words he had for her in return, however, were lost beneath Takayama's booming voice.

"Ah, you have rejoined us from the other side," the mob boss said, purposefully striding towards them. Flanked by Piercings and Broken Nose, his good eye fixed on Gabriel with an air of appraisal. "How unfortunate for you."

While Takayama came to stop in the space between them, Riley's heart skipped a beat as the two lackies went on to stand behind her partner, one at each shoulder, looking more than ready to subdue him if he caused any trouble. She felt rather than saw Scars get into position behind her.

"Now, then," their boss continued, flashing Gabriel a sarcastic smile. "I trust you have thanked your comrade for the pain you soon will endure, for it will be great and it will be due to her actions."

Riley sucked in a breath at his statement. Hearing the sharp intake of air, Takayama turned towards her and gave a cruel chuckle.

"Yes, American," he snarled. "I have every intention of making him suffer. Not only for my own purposes, but because I can see just how very plainly his suffering would affect you."

Riley stiffened in her seat as a chill went down her spine. Was it that obvious? Was she really that easy to read?

Takayama walked over to Gabriel and bent at the waist so that they were both at the same level facing her. "Ah, I can see it in her eyes now," the man murmured near Gabriel's ear. "Can you? Can you see the fear she is attempting to hide? Your infiltration of this ship is a gift to me, for now I can not only hurt her in body, but in mind and soul."

"Let him go," Riley demanded, feeling desperate. "This is between me and you."

Gabriel, who had been stonefaced and silent up to that point, flashed his storming eyes. "Riley..." he growled in warning.

Standing straight, Takayama gave a triumphant laugh. "Bravery does not come so easily now, does it?" he asked her. "You were brave enough to escape, yet you could not bring yourself to allow your comrade to die with honour. You could not pull the trigger when my men discovered you both, and save him from what is to come." Walking over to her, he leaned down close enough for Riley to see the swelling redness across the bridge of his nose and dried blood flaking off his left nostril.

"You should have shown him mercy," Takayama said; good eye glinted with the memory of a similar conversation.

As the mob boss walked behind her, Riley kept her eyes on her partner as he kept his own on what was happening at her back. The moment she felt Takayama's fingertips on her shoulders, the muscles in Gabriel's jaw clamped tight. Silent and fuming, he watched with hawk's eyes as the man slowly traced his way down her arms; tenderly, like a lover. Riley held back a shiver of disgust.

"Get your hands off her," Gabriel threatened coldly, with a voice that was dark and dangerous.

Riley could practically feel Takayama's smile above her as he reached her elbows and proceeded to drag his fingertips back up. Tracing past the uneven fracture of bone in her right arm, he grabbed hold without warning and Riley couldn't stop the gasp of surprise as stabbing pain ripped through her.

"_Hey!_" Gabriel lunged forward with so much force, his chair tipped to follow him. He would have crashed to the floor had it not been for the hands of Piercings and Broken Nose grabbing his shoulders and hauling him back. Riley tried to focus, but the pain was very quickly overwhelming her senses, blacking out her vision as Gabriel seethed and struggled, trying to shake their grasp.

"Get away from her!" he demanded. "I'm the one with information. I'm the one you want!"

Takayama released her arm and Riley slumped forward with the wave of relief. Keeping her head up, she narrowed her eyes at Gabriel as her vision began to clear, still fighting against the burning agony radiating from her shoulder. "Don't..." she gasped between shudders of pain, "...you dare..."

"And now I see that this sense of unwavering loyalty and devotion is reciprocated." Takayama sounded victorious with this newest revelation. "You are just as affected by her pain as she is for yours."

As if to prove his point, the mob leader grabbed hold of Riley's arm again and she jolted upright in her chair as jagged bone met muscle and lightning shattered through her.

Gabriel wrenched against the men, furious with murder in his eyes.

"How did you discover the Charleston?" Takayama asked, holding tight. "Did you act alone, or should I be expecting more foolish heroes?"

"Don't," Riley gasped out. "Don't answer."

She tried to say more, but feared the seraded knife that was cutting her arm from the inside would turn her words into a scream. Trembling with spasms, she begged Gabriel with her eyes to stay quiet.

"You son of a bitch!" Gabriel thrashed, putting Piercings and Broken Nose to the test despite being frighteningly motionless from the elbows down. "Let her go. Let her go _now_!"

Takayama's smile could be heard as he spoke. "Answer, or I shall force the bone through her flesh."

It should have been an easy choice for Gabriel to make: remain silent and let his partner suffer, or give up Griffin and doom them all. Infuriatingly, the torn look on his face told Riley that he was actually having a hard time deciding.

_Don't,_ she pleaded with her eyes. _Don't do it._

Straining against the men who held him, breathing hard from the fight, Gabriel glared at the yakuza boss and began to open his mouth to speak.

"_Takayama._"

All eyes flew to the door as it burst open and Captain Zau barged in. Looking about the room, his mouth screwed up into a scowl and he crossed his brown, weather beaten arms over his chest.

"Ah, Zau, old friend." Releasing Riley, Takayama stepped over to speak to his associate; good eye flickering at the man's confrontational pose. "I pray your visit is not a result of our little disturbance. Rest assured it is being dealt with."

Looking hard from Takayama to Gabriel, Zau narrowed his eyes. "No, I am afraid it is not being dealt with. I see you have captured one man" - he barked a foreign command and a pair of armed crewmen appeared in the doorway with a battered Tattoos between them - "but this one tells me that _two_ attacked him."

Riley's blood immediately turned to ice in her veins. No longer shaking but still trying to hold herself together from the pain, she looked over at Gabriel just in time to see his face turn another shade of gray. He looked hollow.

Takayama's own face darkened. "So there is one other," he murmured. Gesturing towards the door, he gave some commands and Tattoos gave a curt nod of understanding before spinning on his heels and disappearing into the hallway. A moment later, the two crewmen followed suit, under the orders of their own boss.

Riley couldn't understand a word of Japanese or Cantonese, but she could guess at the translations: find the other man at once.

Zau remained where he was. "I would like to speak with you, Takayama," he glowered, nodding to the door. "I seem to recall your guarantee that no one would connect the woman back to my ship. That does not seem to be the case, hmmm?"

Takayama frowned deeply. Looking over at his three men, he left them with a few commands before following Zau out into the hallway and slamming the door behind him. It was done with enough force for Riley to feel the reverbertions through the floor.

Whatever the orders were, Scars, Piercings, and Broken Nose didn't seem particularly interested in following them. Their boss had been gone for less than a second before they were moving together as one, as if operating under a single mind, towards the door. Standing in a group in front of it, they murmured low to one another, eavesdropping on the heated conversation happening in multiple languages on the other side. Every few seconds, one head or another would turn their way with a menacing scowl.

Gabriel looked towards his partner; his gaze trailing from her throbbing right arm up to her face. His own had beads of sweat collecting across his hairline, with a few which had succumb to gravity and fallen down his gray cheek to drip off his jaw.

Riley's heart thrummed out an urgent beat, in sync with the single word that was pounding through her head:_ hospital hospital hospital hospital hospital._

Watching her silently, Gabriel swallowed and the pained look in his eyes was replaced with cold blue steel. "I'm gonna get you outta here, Riley," he said, in a tone so heavy with stubborn determination it was startling, even for her.

Riley stared at him, baffled by the prospect and not even sure where to begin. "Gabriel, you're dying!" she blurted out first. "What're you even doing here? You never should have come. Why couldn't you have just gone to the hospital like I'd asked?"

"And what?" he challenged. "Sit in some bed imagining up all the ways they were gonna kill you? You really think I was gonna do that?"

"You should have," she snapped in response. "It's not your job to keep me alive."

"You're my partner, Riley. What my job is doesn't matter."

This brought her up short as her heart foolishly skipped a beat.

No. This was not the time for sentiment.

"Of course your job matters," she argued, quickly recovering. "It matters to all the people out there whose lives you've saved."

"Lives _we've_ saved," Gabriel immediately countered. "_Together_."

Riley huffed in frustration, amazed by his stubbornness. "Look," she tried again. "I know we always say that we're partners, but the truth is that it's a partnership with a caveat. If only one of us gets to live, then it has to be you. It has to be."

As he shook his head emphatically, Gabriel started rapidly blinking. "No. I never asked for that," he growled. "You're not a sacrifice, damn it. I'm not gonna let you die for me."

"Gabriel..." Riley took a breath and voiced the truth that she had always known and he had always tried to ignore. "I'm supposed to."

"Like hell, you – "

All at once, Gabriel's colour turned alarmingly white and he gave a stilted gasp.

"Gabriel?!" Riley cried out. "Gabriel!"

She felt her heart seizing up as the three men came back over, surrounding her partner and blocking her view of him. Frantic, she kept calling out his name, even when Takayama charged back into the room. He spoke rapidly, face red as a bull's, as he looked with a piercing eye from Gabriel to her. Then he barked out a few more sentences.

"Talk to me," Riley pleaded, struggling to see around the men's backs as one lifted up her partner's fingers and another felt his chest. "Say something!"

There was a stomach dropping moment of silence, then Gabriel's growl cut through.

"Get your hands off me."

As the three men moved away to make their report, Riley felt dizzy with relief as Gabriel came back into view and he gave her a small nod. His breathing was slow, but deep. He was still getting oxygen, even if his face was as white as her's felt.

But there was more going on than just what she could see.

As if to confirm Riley's nagging fears, Takayama looked at Gabriel with obvious interest. "They tell me that your fingernails are blue and heart does not beat in the regular way."

The thumping drumbeat was back in Riley's head, urgently banging out its single word.

_Hospital. Hospital. HOSPITAL._

"When Miyazaki was confessing his failure to kill Abe, he made mention of throwing the wine at an American agent in order to escape," Takayama continued thoughtfully. Riley could practically see the wheels turning in his head as he put the pieces together. Then all at once his eyebrows shot up to his cropped hairline. "_You_ were that man. And you came knowing the poison would soon steal your last breath." Looking over at Riley, he studied her for a moment in a new light. "All this for a woman," he finally mused. "How pitiful."

Gabriel sat stiff and ridged in the chair, silent and unmoving save for the burning flames of hatred in his eyes. Takayama's lips curled in response. "Destiny, it seems, has already claimed you, but allow me to make a small contribution." He started to walk towards Gabriel, pulling back a fist.

Riley blurted out "_No!_" but it fell on deaf ears. The punch landed hard in Gabriel's ribs and she practically heard the crack of bone as he doubled over with a grunt.

Straightening and rubbing idly at his knuckles, Takayama smiled with ruthless satisfaction. "To help with your breathing," he explained, as if a reason was required.

"You damn bastard!" Riley cried.

Takayama turned on her. "You do not like that I am allowing him to suffocate to death?" he asked in challenge. "When he is grasping for his final wisps of oxygen, remember that you are the one who chose his fate. Remember that you prolonged his death by keeping him alive. His pain and suffering are due to your cowardice," - he smiled like he had an ace up his sleeve - "and I still have another man to collect my information from."

Riley fought with everything she had left. "It doesn't have to be this way," she argued desperately. "We can make a deal."

"Deal? You wish to make a deal?!" Takayama threw his head back and laughed. "Abe was to die. The laws against my organization were to come down. Only if you possess the power to turn back the clock and change the past would I accept a deal from you!"

Moving towards the center table, he picking up the blowtorch, flicked it to life, and waved the blue flame just below her chin, close enough for Riley to feel the heat of it.

"As it is, you have nothing to offer me but your suffering and I am anxious to resume it." Takayama grabbed her throat to hold her still and raised the blowtorch towards her face. "Perhaps I shall start with that vulgar mouth of yours."

"Dalian…" Gabriel wheezed. "I know about the Port of Dalian."

Takayama reared up like he'd been shocked and turned to her partner; momentarily distracted. "Dalian?" he repeated in surprise. "What could you possibly claim to know about it?"

The name rang like an alarm in Riley's head. She had heard it mentioned earlier, and struggled to recall the context. It had been on the main deck - a conversation between the Captain and Takayama.

_'And the body?'_

_'Shall be sinking to the bottom of the Pacific before we reach Dalian'_

"I know...that's where you're taking the guns," Gabriel breathed, fighting his broken ribs for air. "I know it's a hotbed for drug trafficking, with North Korea only a ferry ride away and a huge producer of meth." He took another shaking breath, seeing that he had Takayama's full attention. "I know that at 9:00 a.m. tomorrow, you're meeting with a go-between Triad member by the name of Heung Wah-yim. In exchange for the guns...he's filling your truck with North Korea's purest crystal meth to sell on the streets back in Japan. Right now, no one will dare buy a gram off your drug pushers with the laws still in place. I may not be able to go back in time...but I can change that. I can get the Yakuza Exclusionary Laws taken down."

The air went out of Riley's lungs. She prayed to have misheard him. "Gabriel, what are you doing?" she asked breathlessly.

The blowtorch slipped unnoticed from Takayama's hand and clacked forgotten to the floor. "How?" he demanded. "How could you possibly accomplish such a feat?"

"With the skeletons in the closets," Gabriel answered. "I've got the dirt on everyone and know where the bodies are buried. I'll give you that intel and you can use it to blackmail the people in power. Threaten that you'll go public with it unless they have the laws revoked. In return..." - he paused for a deep, painful breath but also to meet Riley's wide eyes - "you'll let her go. My intel for her safety – and Charles Griffin's; the other agent I came aboard with. Those are my terms."

Riley stared at him; her mind blank with shock. "Gabriel...you can't do this. You can't be serious..."

Stone faced, he looked away from her and over to their enemy. "Do we have a deal?" he asked with forced calm.

Takayama ran two fingers down his pencil mustache, smoothing it out as he considered the offer. Then he looked at Scars, who had once again taken up position behind her, and gave the slightest nod.

Scars went to the center table and picked up one of the confiscated items; the knife Riley had stolen from the galley.

"No!" she shouted as he began to cut the rope at her left wrist. "No, I'm not agreeing to that. I won't leave." A bubble of hysteria began to form in her stomach as the rope was sawed through. "Gabriel, you can't do this! I'm not leaving you. I won't!"

The moment the ropes loosened enough, Riley lunged for the gun holster at Scars's waist. She was too slow. In a flash, he grabbed up her wrist with his free hand and held the knife to her throat.

"Riley..." Gabriel caught her eyes and there was the briefest moment of unfiltered anguish in his own. Then he went back to white stone. "I'm sorry I got you into this mess," he said hoarsely. "Don't fight this. Just go."

It was Gabriel's version of a goodbye.

"_Forget it!_" Riley spat, feeling sick and dizzy with desperation. Wrenching at her wrist, she fought hard to break free of Scars's grasp, even as the knife dug into her skin. Broken Nose and Piercings joined in to hold her down. "You don't get to make that kind of decision. Think about what you're doing!" she rallied. "Think about Dr. Cassidy. You're like a son to him. Think about what this will do to him and all the people who care about you! Think about what this will do to Japan!"

_And to me,_ she silently added.

Gabriel made no response, his eyes dedicatedly fixed on the floor.

It took the three men considerable effort, but they managed to free Riley from the ropes without her managing to land more than a glancing kick or punch. Piercings picked her up by the legs and Broken Nose lifted her up under the arms as she continued to thrash.

"Put me down. Put me down!" she cried. "I'm not leaving this ship!"

But instead of carrying her out the door, the two men moved the few feet over to the center table, where Scars was knocking everything to the floor with a broad stroke of his arm. Space cleared, they dumped her onto it and held her as still as they could against her struggling.

"Hey!" Gabriel barked, his voice rising in alarm. "I thought we had a deal. You're supposed to be getting her outta here."

"You supposed wrong," Takayama answered, giving Scars a subtle look as he walked towards Gabriel. "I never consented to your proposal." Walking behind him, he darted an arm around Gabriel's neck and yanked him back into a headlock.

This had apparently been a cue. With a look of anticipation, Scars positioned himself by Piercings at Riley's feet. Tossing the knife carelessly to the floor, his fingers brushed aside the slit in her dress before casually sliding down her thigh.

Gabriel lurched, but Takayama's arm across his throat held him in place.

Riley was struggling to jerk her leg away with little success. Piercings had gravity on his side as he held her tight by the ankles, and no matter how hard she fought, the leverage he had was too much for her to break.

"You see, Narusawa is particularly fond of gaijin women," Takayama explained, keeping his arm clamped tight. "Especially when their skin is marred as his. He finds this trait particularly rare and all the more alluring."

Gabriel was fighting to leap out of the chair at that point, and his face was starting to turn red with the effort.

"Listen to me, Gabriel." Riley tried to keep her voice level despite the fact that her heart was ready to beat right out of her chest. "No matter what happens, you don't tell them anything. Got that? Not a thing!"

Smiling, Takayama firmly kept his hold. "Since I am not about to allow your precious American to bleed to death or seek the escape of her pain through unconsiousness, my counteroffer is this: you will share with me your wealth of intelligence, or you will lay witness as Narusawa pleasures himself with her body. Deny me the smallest detail, and he will ravage her."

"_I'm gonna kill you,_" Gabriel choked out, fighting against Takayama with everything he had. "_I'm gonna slit your throat and watch you die!_"

Lust in his eyes, Scars started to undo the buckle at his belt.

"Promise me, Gabriel." Riley steeled herself for what was to come, but still struggled fruitlessly to prevent it. "Promise me that you won't give in."

Scars's pants dropped to the floor, and Gabriel went completely still. Wild eyes fixed on her - or was he looking at something a fraction higher? - he slowly leaned back against the chair, wheezing and heaving for oxygen while the redness in his face drained back to that unnatural white. As Takayama released his grip and nodded for Scars to hold off, Riley saw Gabriel get that faraway, distracted look in his eyes.

He was chipping into something.

Sensing a victory, Takayama came to stand in front of Gabriel. "So," he smirked. "Do we have a deal?"

"I've got a better idea," Gabriel coughed out, meeting Takayama's gaze as the fire of hatred flickered in his eyes and the tiniest of smiles formed at his lips. "How's about I'll see you in hell?"

_DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING_

The blare of the fire alarm caught everyone off guard and as Takayama jumped in surprise, the noise was quickly followed by two cracks of gunshots. Blood exploded from the man's chest. As he crashed to the floor, the entire room fell into chaos.

While the men spun towards the direction of the gunfire and reached for their weapons, a third shot thundered out just as Riley swung a leg and kicked Piercings hard in the head. He dropped only a fraction later than Broken Nose, who was bleeding from a bullet in his chest.

Rolling off the table and hitting the floor, Riley grabbed the closest gun and finished Piercings off. Then she took aim and put two in Scars's back while he was busy returning fire at her rescuer.

The fire alarm went silent. As the dust settled and an eerie calm set in, none other than one Agent Charlie Griffin emerged from his cover behind the galley entranceway.

"Hey, Thriller," he breathed in relief. Stowing his gun, he extended a helping hand as he made his way over to her. "You okay?"

Allowing herself the briefest moment of pure joy at the sight of him, Riley accepted the help up and gave him a quick nod before snatching up the knife Scars had used to cut her out of the ropes. Rushing over to Gabriel, she began to do the same.

"Riley," he wheezed, trying to meet her eyes as she focused exclusively on freeing him. "You sure you're okay?"

Sawing at the rope binding his wrist, she couldn't block out the hollowness of his voice. It was then that she realized her hand was shaking. "We've got to get you out of here," she insisted, although her own voice was shaking as well.

"Here, let me do it." Griffin appeared at her side and took the knife from her, slicing through the rope with expedient force.

Gabriel scowled at the man. "Cut that rescue a little close, don't you think?" he snarled. "Where the hell've you been?"

Shooting him a scathing look, Griffin made quick work of the bindings at Gabriel's other wrist. "That had better not be your idea of a thank you for saving your ass."

By that point, Riley had managed to get her head back in the game. "We're not out of the woods, yet," she told them, as Griffin cut through the ropes at her partner's feet. "Gabriel, is there any chance you can you stand?"

Digging his elbows into the chair arms, he was already trying to do just that. Griffin hoisted him up, but his legs wobbled from under him and he collapsed back in the chair, gasping in ragged breaths.

"I'll take that as a no," Griffin said with a complete lack of surprise. "I told you this was going to happen. Didn't I tell you this was going to happen?!"

Shooting daggers at the agent, Riley placed a hand on Gabriel's bloodless cheek. His skin was cold and damp with sweat. "Breathe, Gabriel," she coaxed him, trying to at least sound more calm than she felt as every brain cell screamed _HOSPITAL._ "I know it hurts, but you have to breathe. Just concentrate on that."

He gave her a slow shake of his head. "Riley, Griffin's right. There's a whole crew of guys left and we know they're armed." He paused to force in a shaking lungful of air. "I can flip the fire alarm back on to buy you more time. You've gotta use it."

"Shut up," she ordered, losing some of that calm. "Just shut up and breathe, okay? You know damn well I'm not leaving without you." Turning to Griffin, she gave a nod towards the table. "Get all the guns. And you, " - she pointed at Gabriel, fixing him with a no-nonsense look - "you're putting your vest on."

Leaving her partner in the chair and ignoring his protestations, Riley hurried over to fetch the vest Takayama's men had relieved Gabriel of earlier while he'd still been unconcious. It had been pushed to the floor by Scars, along with the rest of the confiscated items.

Picking it up off the floor, she heard Gabriel shout and spun back just in time to see him launch himself from his chair towards Takayama's body.

Except the Yakuza boss wasn't dead. With what had to be his remaining strength, he had managed to prop himself up on one arm, and with the other take aim with his gun.

He had aimed it right at her.

There was a crack of sound, followed by an invisible force that knocked Riley back against the table. Oddly, though, there was no pain. In fact, it felt to Riley like she was floating, weightless. Vaguely, it occurred to her that she had gone into shock, and she looked down to see her hand pressed to her chest. When she pulled that hand away, there was a shining coat of blood across her fingers.

Riley heard cracks of thunder as her legs collapsed and she fell to the floor. Staring up at the ceiling, Gabriel appeared above her; his face tight with fear as the edges of her vision darkened.

"Riley. Riley!" His voice sounded far away, like he was calling to her from a mountaintop. "Can you hear me? You're gonna be okay. All right? Are you listening? I said you're gonna be okay, just stay with me."

She tried to shake her head. No. Riley knew immediately that she wasn't going to be okay. She knew this because Griffin could only help one person get off the ship alive. That person was Gabriel. It was going to be him who survived.

"No," she heard herself whisper. "Not me…"

Griffin appeared in her tunnel of vision. "What'd she say?" he asked. His eyes were wide, assessing her while his hands pressed to stop the flow of blood.

"Doesn't matter," Gabriel wheezed, ashen faced as he kept his gaze locked on her. He was sounding farther and farther away as the darkness crept closer. She fought against its pull.

"Riley, stay with me," he demanded between gasps for air. It had to be the poison that was making it so hard for him to breathe. "Stay with me, damn it."

She tried to speak again. She tried to tell them to go and get to the lifeboats, but no sound came out. Her eyelids fluttered, growing heavier as she lost the battle to stay awake. She could just see Gabriel through the shade of darkness; his voice urgent, laboured and trembling, and echoing thousands of miles away as her eyes began to close and the nothingness consumed her.

"Griffin, you've gotta get her – _Riley_. Riley, keep your eyes open. Do you hear me? Do not close them. God, Riley, don't close them. Don't…don't do this. Don't do this to me, Riley. Riley? _Riley!_"


	15. St Luke's

**St. Luke's International Hospital, Tokyo  
Main Building, ICCU Room 507  
06:07 JST**

As Riley dimly opened her eyes, the first question to cross her mind was who had redecorated her bedroom. That wasn't her clock on the wall. That wasn't her brightly coloured painting of koi fish. The bed sheets were an odd mint green. Groggy and confused, she couldn't shake the feeling that something was terribly wrong.

It took a few long moments of blinking the fuzziness away before realizing those small decorating choices weren't the only differences. The room she was in also had a sink and mirror, a length of medicinal cabinets along the wall, and a monitoring system built into the foot of her bed.

Then as the buzz of pain and steady sound of electronic beeping came into focus, Riley figured out with a startling jolt just what exactly was off about the whole thing.

She was supposed to be dead.

So why wasn't she?

"Gabriel," Riley whispered hoarsely. "_Gabriel."_

Panic curling through her, Riley fought to pull the last fuzzy memories she had from her drug-addled brain. Dimly, she remembered trying to tell the two men who'd been hovering over her to get down to the lifeboats. She remembered thinking that a containership in the middle of Tokyo Bay was as good a place as any to die. Because Gabriel could hardly move and Griffin…he couldn't save them both.

Vaguely, Riley registered the frantic tone of machines as her heart rate soared.

"Ms. Neal, you're awake." A large brunette woman in blue nursing scrubs hurried through the door, looking like a worried mother hen as the blood drained from Riley's face. "You're safe now, honey. No need to panic. Everything's all right – "

"_No!_" Riley cried out. "No, everything's not all right! Don't you get it?! _I'm _alive. That means he's…he's…" The word stuck hard as her throat closed up and tears blurred her vision. It couldn't be true, but what other explanation was there?

"He's _dead!_" she choked out. "Oh, God...he's dead..."

"Riley? Christ - what's wrong?!"

All at once, Griffin was at her side with a wide-eyed look of astonishment and confusion on his unshaven face. Hot tears running down her cheeks, seeing him made Riley's blood boil.

"_You!_" she pointed with raging accusation. "What did he say to you?! How easily did he convince you to leave him behind?" Griffin jerked back in surprise, hands raised in defence like her finger was a gun. "I'm the one..." she faltered, voice beginning to shake. "I was supposed to..."

But Riley had no more words. All she could think of was that Gabriel was gone. That he had made the choice of who would survive and foolishly picked her. Her partner, her friend, the one man in the world Riley could undoubtedly say she both respected and trusted, had chosen to die so she could live.

And she hadn't been able to stop him.

Letting out a choked cry of anguish, the grief surged up and crashed over her like a wave. And as voices swirled all around, Riley couldn't hear anything above the sound of her own heart wrenching sobs. Shutting her eyes and ears to the chaos of the world, she let herself drown.

And she sank deeper.

And deeper.

And deeper…

"He's_ alive_!" Griffin boomed. "Would you pay attention already? Vaughn's _alive_."

Riley's eyes burst open. Her head pulsed with shock.

Uncontrollable shaking, she tried to reconcile what had been said with the impossible.

Could it true? Could Griffin really have done it?

Taking in an erratic breath and blinking away tears, the watery, unfocused blur in front of her sharpened into the agent's scruffy face. Hovering just inches from her own, his hard expression barely changed as she stared back at him speechlessly, wanting - but afraid – to believe.

"How?" she whispered, between gasps for breath.

Blowing out a puff of air, Griffin rubbed a hand over his eyes in exasperation. "The coast guard," he simply explained. "They were called in." Then he pulled away and stood over her with his arms crossed, watching Riley closely like he was waiting for her to fall apart again. "The doctors say Vaughn should fully recover. Now calm down before you hurt yourself," the agent ordered with blunt irritation.

Words sinking in one after the other, it took only a few moments for the tears to resume their fall. Smiling, trembling, laughing and crying, Riley made no attempt to stop the salty drops as they slid down her cheeks and dripped off her jaw. She was too joyously relieved to even notice.

At some point, when the pain in her chest became too much and she was as emotionally as she was physically exhausted, Riley wiped the last of the tears away.

Taking her cue, the nurse stepped forward. "There, now. Hush," she cooed. Pulling a tissue from the box on the nightstand, she dabbed carefully at Riley's cheeks. Warm and gentle, she had a kindly round face, soft brown eyes, and plump valentine lips. "All better," she smiled, tossing the tissue into a nearby waste basket. "Now, honey, my name's Joyce. I'm your day nurse, and I promise to take good care of you."

Exhausted and pain-filled as she was, Riley felt a bit giddy as she returned Joyce's smile. "Nice to meet you, Joyce. My name's Riley, and I promise I'm not always like that." Then her giddiness faded slightly as she glanced at all the machines and tubes. "When can I go see him?"

Griffin, who was leaning his back against the wall, let out a noise of exasperation. Then he rolled his eyes and crossed his arms.

Joyce gave her a sympathetic look. "Mr. Vaughn? Well, I suppose that depends. You see, there's a chest tube taped up snug against your ribs right now running into your left lung. You won't be leaving this bed until the doctor says." Turning back the bed sheet, she lifted up the hospital shirt Riley had been dressed in and Riley caught a glance of a thick plastic tube snaking over the side of the bed before her shirt came down again. "Looks good. No kinks or bubbling around the seal," Joyce reported. "As for Mr. Vaughn…" she smoothed the sheets and turned away from the bed towards a number of IV bags, inspecting each one. "Once his muscle strength started returning, he was transferred to a private room up on the seventh floor. I called up just a tick ago and was told he's still sleeping like a baby, but I'll tell you what; maybe later today when you're both awake, and if his nurse thinks he's able, we can have him brought down in a wheelchair. How does that sound?"

To Riley, it sounded like torture. She didn't want to wait until 'maybe later'. Every cell in her body was telling her to get up out of the bed, find Gabriel, and throw her arms around him. It wasn't that she didn't believe Joyce and Griffin, but that would make it real.

Riley smiled and nodded gratefully instead. "Thank you."

Joyce beamed back at her, waving the comment away like no thanks were necessary. "Oh, honey, you're welcome."

Humming a tune, she delicately picked up Riley's left hand and inspected the plastic IV tubes taped to the back of it. After that, she moved around to the other side of the bed and carefully repositioned the sling which cradled Riley's right arm. "Everything looks as right as it can," Joyce said, walking around to the foot of the bed and tapping at the monitoring system. "I'll come in and check on you again in a little bit but if you need anything in the meantime, don't you even hesitate. Push on that little red button there and I'll come running." Finishing her data entry, she gave Riley one last big smile. "Now I'm sure you've got all kinds of questions, but remember, honey: rest. Your body needs to heal, and you need to let it."

Riley nodded obediently and as the nurse walked past him towards the door, Griffin gave her a brief nod and mumbled, "Thanks, Joyce."

"You're very welcome, Mr. Griffin," she beamed, looking his haggard appearance up and down with a critical eye. "You should get some rest too, you know. Otherwise you'll wind up in a bed right next to your friend here."

Eyes on the floor, he nodded again. "Yeah, sure." Though as Joyce disappeared into the hallway, Griffin continued standing with his back against the wall, and eyes cast downwards.

Giving him a good look for the first time, Riley noted he was still wearing the shirt and dress pants he'd had on at the gala, although the shirt was almost completely unbuttoned to reveal the undershirt beneath. At one point bleach white, it was also dirty and wrinkled, with smatterings of dried blood around the rolled up sleeves, which Riley guessed was her own. Other than the dark circles beneath his eyes and the purplish-blue bruises on one cheek, it looked to her that Griffin was definitely tired, but otherwise unharmed.

And he was definitely annoyed.

"Sorry, Griff," she began. "I didn't mean to – "

"Lose your goddamn mind?" he finished with a cold glare. Letting out a heavy sigh of defeat, Griffin pushed himself away from the wall and fell bodily into the chair next to Riley's bed. Scrubbing roughly at his face, he waved a dismissive hand like he was too tired to argue. "Sure. No problem. Just go to sleep, would you?"

Logically, Riley knew she should. Her eyelids were heavy with fatigue and exhaustion tugged like an insistent child with the sweet promise of pain relief. But Joyce was right: she did have questions, and her heart buzzed with the anticipation of seeing Gabriel, without any intention of slowing down.

It was going to be a long wait.

"Tell me more about the coast guard," she prodded. "How'd it go down?"

Resting his forearms on his knees, Griffin gave her a look. For a moment, Riley thought he might just tell her again to go to sleep, but then with a long sigh he conceded and began the story. "You passed out and Vaughn was…" – he paused, and Riley already knew the answer – "being Vaughn. I was trying to work out a plan, and all of a sudden the door's banged in and we're surrounded."

Riley nodded at the execution, wondering how the coast guard had even gotten involved in the first place. "So the Organized Crime Control Division has enough pull to call them in?" she guessed.

Griffin ran his hand through his ruffled hair. "Sort of. See, Vaughn and I were coming to get you and the guy nearly collapsed on me. We started arguing and your people put two and two together after Vaughn – like the genius he is – went and cut communication. Your boss got on the horn with the OCCD to see what they could do, and they turned around and called in the coast guard for immediate intervention. I don't think the coast guard would have scrambled so fast, but it turns out Abe got wind of what was going on and told the police that if needed, they could make any orders they wanted on his behalf."

"To keep Finnegan happy," Riley assumed.

Although Griffin nodded in agreement, he averted her eyes and she heard him mutter "Probably."

"Probably?" Riley repeated in surprise. "What do you mean 'probably'?"

Based on the look of shock on his face, Griffin hadn't counted on her actually hearing what he'd said. Caught, he frowned for a second before rolling his eyes and shrugging like it was no big deal. "He liked Captain America. Seems Japan's got a thing for idiotic bravery."

Blinking, it took Riley's tired, drug addled brain a few seconds to realize that Griffin was talking about Gabriel. Then she was simply stunned.

"Anyway, there were two choppers outside and the whole ship was surrounded," Griffin pushed on. "And I'm talking like an army here; patrol ships, guard boats, surveillance…these guys didn't mess around. You and Vaughn got lifted to the choppers and they took off straight for the hospital. I went back on one of the boats, got in contact with your agency, and spent the next couple hours on the phone being debriefed by Director Strand. I hung up and five minutes later they were wheeling you out of surgery."

Continuing down that path of conversation, Griffin leaned back against the chair and nodded to Riley's chest. "Pulmonary laceration. The bullet grazed your left lung and you were bleeding into it. Missed your ribs by a couple of centimeters, though."

Thoughts travelling from Gabriel to the reason she couldn't get up and go see him, Riley frowned. As much as it was saving her life, she didn't particularly care for the plastic tube stuffed inside her, tasked with sucking out any residual liquid from her lung. It made her feel like a caged animal and it hurt like all hell to boot.

"Lucky me," Riley said dryly.

"You _were_ lucky," Griffin insisted. "You could've drowned in your own blood, you know. Trauma surgeon said the chest tube will come out in a couple days once the lung tissue's healed, and that Jameson guy's already got a respiratory therapist lined up for when you're back home. I told Joyce earlier you're a fast healer, so she's thinking full recovery in three months." He paused, and his gaze moved to her right arm. "But _that_…"

Looking down at the sling which rested loosely against her stomach, Riley tried wiggling her fingers, not thinking too hard about the diagnosis. "Let me guess - it's broken."

Griffin gave her a small, wry smile. "Proximal humerus fracture," he explained. "You'll have to sleep sitting up for the next little while so gravity can help keep the bones in place, and it'll be at least six months before they put you back in the field. There's nothing but desk duty and physio in your near future." Riley made a face at the prospect.

"And Gabriel's future?" Even knowing the answer, she wanted to hear it again. Even more, she wanted to see Gabriel answer that question himself.

Griffin sighed as if he was already tired of being asked. "Like I said; the doctors told me he'll make a full recovery." Stopping there, it appeared to Riley that he was content to drop the subject, and only begrudgingly continued on when he caught her look.

"So they had him hooked up to a ventilator for a while in the ICCU, plus a crash cart was ready to go just in case he went into cardiac arrest. But they never ended up needing it because he started getting better. They took the tube out about" – he glanced at his watch – "two hours ago and that's when he got moved to the private room on the seventh floor." Griffin then shrugged like they were talking about a cold instead of a deadly poison. "In cases like his, the night nurse said tetrodotoxin usually takes a couple days to completely clear out. So come tomorrow, the only real thing that Vaughn'll have to worry about will be a couple broken ribs." Raising an eyebrow, he added; "That, and whether he still has a job."

Pausing at his comment, Riley suddenly felt uneasy. Since waking up and finding out he was alive, her thoughts with respect to Gabriel hadn't travelled much past desperately needing to see him. But Griffin's mention of an argument and Gabriel deliberately cutting ties with CDOC in order to continue mission weren't things that Lillian would take lightly. And that wasn't even the full story.

"It was pretty bad, huh?" Riley ventured.

"Pretty bad?" Griffin gave a derisive scoff. "The damn idiot was dying and nothing I said or did made any difference. Yeah, I'll say it was pretty bad." Shutting his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose, Griffin shook his head with the memory of it all.

"Christ…" he muttered under his breath. "And to think I actually believed him when I asked if you two were sleeping together."

"We…what?!" Riley sputtered. "You asked him…?" Thinking back to what seemed like weeks ago, she hazily recalled a moment in the Grand Ballroom after the sweep when Griffin and Gabriel had briefly been left alone together, and the latter's mood had subsequently darkened.

Now she understood.

"We're _not _sleeping together. It's…" Riley shook her head weakly, feeling her cheeks heat as her gaze fell to the folds in her mint green blankets. "We're just friends. It's not like that."

Raising a skeptical eyebrow, Griffin looked silently from the heart monitor as it cheerfully gave away her racing pulse, to the bunched up fistful of blanket clenched tightly in her hand. "Really?" he asked evenly. "It's not like that, huh?" Leaning forward on his arms, Griffin shot her a look of annoyance. "Just who the hell do you think you're fooling?"

Surprised by the question, Riley met his eyes and found him watching her expectantly, as if he was resigned to waiting for some sort of confession. Tight lipped, she looked away, not wanting Griffin to see her cheeks heat up as the truth sank in.

Who did she think she was fooling?

Apparently just herself.

* * *

**Angel's Bluff, Virginia**  
**United States Cyber Command, Director's Office **  
**17:26 EST**

"She fought it pretty hard, but didn't stay awake for much longer after that. She seems to be doing all right, though."

Sitting at her desk with phone in one hand and double whiskey on the rocks in the other, Lillian Strand gave a relieved nod to the caller. "And how is she handling everything?"

"Uh…" Griffin paused in thought. "She was…a little confused at first, but after I explained things to her she was fine. Just really tired."

Raising an eyebrow at his hesitation, Lillian couldn't help but wonder exactly what 'a little confused' meant. Swirling her glass on the mahogany, she watched the golden liquid as it sloshed around and around. The cubes of ice clinked like frozen wind chimes.

"I'm happy to hear she's resting, then. But if Riley's up for it later, I'd love to speak to her myself. Hear her voice," Lillian added with a gentle smile.

"Sure. I, uh...I need to get back to the hotel, so I'll have Joyce call you the next time Riley wakes up."

Lillian nodded appreciatively. "Of course. Thank you, Agent Griffin. I realize your involvement in this mission went well beyond the original parameters, but I'm grateful for everything you've done for my agency and my agents. President Finnegan will be hearing from me what an asset you've been."

"Thanks," he said dryly. "I'd like to keep my job."

Exchanging good-byes, Lillian was just dropping the phone back into its cradle when she saw a fast moving blur in her peripheral. Looking up, she spotted Jameson through the glass walls of her office. Rumpled shirt halfway unbuttoned and sleeves rolled up to the elbows, she didn't think he'd yet gone home to sleep or even change since the mission had began.

Pulling her door open, Jameson covered the mic on his headset with one hand as he poked his head in. "Lillian, I've got Gabriel's nurse on the line. He's awake."

Lillian took a breath. "Thank you, Jameson. Put it through," she answered, nodding to her desk phone. "And Jameson?" Already turned to go, he looked back at her expectantly; drooping eyes plagued with fatigue. "They're going to be fine. Now rest."

Giving her a tired smile and a brief nod, Chris Jameson closed the door and hurried off; she hoped in search of a bed.

Turning her attention towards the blinking light on her phone, Lillian took a long sip of whiskey before picking up. "Hello, Gabriel. How're you - "

"What the hell happened to Riley?! Her chart says she was 'agitated upon awaking' and should be kept under observation in case of 'any further distress'," Gabriel ranted. "Why the hell'd you tell the nurse to dope me? I should've been there. She never should've woken up alone."

Well, he was certainly feeling better.

Taking a deep, calming breath while Gabriel seethed, Lillian reminded herself that he was still recovering from two fractured ribs and a deadly poison. Plus if his raspy, hoarse voice was anything to go by, he also had one hell of a sore throat from the tube they'd put down his trachea. She needed to take it easy on him - at least for now.

"I made that request because despite what you seem to think, _you_ needed rest, as well," Lillian explained. "And Riley _didn't_ wake up alone. After his debriefing, Agent Griffin offered to stay with her and I accepted. Now I'll admit he wouldn't have been my first choice, but he made himself available and brought Riley up to speed before she fell back asleep." Swirling her glass on the desk, Lillian studied the forming bubbles, cautiously adding; "She may have been confused or agitated at first, but I do believe she's all right now."

There was a pause as Gabriel considered her answer. Lillian knew he wouldn't be happy that Griffin had made an effort to stick around, but she also knew he would accept the fact that _someone _had been there for Riley – even if that someone hadn't been him.

"You really think she's okay?" he finally asked.

Lillian nodded, smiling. "I do. She's strong, Gabriel. Riley's been through a lot, but she's strong. You know that."

His tone was considerably gentler as he answered; "Yeah, I do."

"Good. And how are _you _doing?"

"Peachy."

Raising an eyebrow at the finality of the word, Lillian decided it was time for a change of topic. Pulling open a drawer, she grabbed a pad of paper and a pen and dropped both on the desk next to her drink.

"In that case, you can explain to me just what exactly happened after you and Agent Griffin nearly shot each other."

Gabriel let out a sigh. "I was wondering when you'd ask about that."

Lillian tapped the end of her pen on a corner of the notepad, leaving behind tiny little dents in the paper. "Frankly, I'm hoping you'll deny it actually happened. I'd like to think you have more common sense than to attack and threaten the detail leader for the President of the United States."

She wasn't holding her breath, though.

As if in confirmation, the anger Lillian sensed radiating off of Gabriel in the charged silence practically heated the phone in her hand.

"Lillian…" he warned. "The guy was giving up on Riley. Said we had to abort."

"I know, Gabriel," she answered softly. "Agent Griffin was making what he thought was the best decision given the circumstances."

"You're _defending_ him?!" he sputtered.

Sighing, Lillian rubbed at her tired eyes. "No, I'm reminding you that sometimes there are no 'good' decisions. Sometimes there are only ones that will hurt us and others that will hurt us more." Lillian gripped the pen in her hand. "I know you don't like it and I know we don't always agree, but it's my job to ensure that the decisions which are made are the ones that will hurt us the least."

Gabriel let out a growl. "You_ are_ defending him."

Lillian threw up a hand in exacerbation. "How can I when Riley's alive?" she countered. "You took an enormous risk, Gabriel, but in the end you all made it out alive." Thinking briefly of Prime Minister Abe's support, she added; "And from the sounds of it, it was _because_ of that risk."

In the silence that followed, Lillian picked up the tumbler and swallowed another mouthful of whiskey. The ice was starting to melt. "Unfortunately, however, there are people who will question that risk. Weatherly, Tetazoo…certainly the President himself. They'll see what you did as proof that _you_ are a risk. That you don't follow orders and can't be controlled."

Pen poised in her hand, Lillian looked at the blank page in front of her and debated telling Gabriel about a recent conversation she'd had about checks and balances. About the belief that his current insubordination was a precursor for the day he became more chip than man. What Gabriel didn't know was that the seeds of mistrust had already been planted. And if Lillian wanted to protect her asset, then she needed to stop those seeds from sprouting.

"Gabriel, you have to give me a reason," she commanded. "I need a damn good reason to feed to these wolves in order to keep them off our backs."

There was a long, hollow pause. Silently eying her drink, Lillian grimly wondered if her agent was deciding on an answer by replaying the night in his head. Maybe even the part she had yet to be filled in on. Since Griffin had split his time between trying to find the others and hiding from crew members, Lillian could only guess how Gabriel had gone from searching for Riley to tied up in a chair, and she had gone from escaping custody to what Griffin hadn't hesitated to describe as his rescue of her from an impending gang rape. It was a conversation Lillian wasn't looking forward to have.

Finally Gabriel said something, but his voice so low, so tight with emotion, she had to strain into the receiver to hear.

"Riley was gonna die," he edged out. "The things they did to her…what they were _planning _to do…" Gabriel took a ragged breath and in the silence that followed, Lillian wondered if he'd even finish. "You're asking me for a reason, but you already know what it is."

The Director of Cyber Command took a second to consider this, then quickly shot back the rest of her whiskey. "Yes," she quietly answered, feeling the liquid burn down her throat. "Yes, I suppose I do."

* * *

**St. Luke's International Hospital, Tokyo  
Main Building, ICCU Ward  
06:41 JST**

507\. He was almost at room 507.

Clumsily maneuvering his way around staff and other patients, Gabriel tried to keep his frustration at bay as it continued to rise. Honestly, it was bad enough he had to submit to being in a wheelchair, since his traitorous legs were still more or less dead weights. Bad enough that he'd just about needed to threaten his nurse so she'd leave him alone and not try wheeling him to Riley's room herself. But for God's sake, trying to use his mostly working arms to steer around slow walkers and janitors pushing mop buckets who had nowhere else to be but in his way was something else.

Narrowly missing a distracted surgeon on his smartphone, Gabriel rounded a corner and nearly took out someone's knees.

"_Damn it_," he cursed, looking up to see who he'd just about played bumper cars with.

It was Charlie Griffin.

"Having trouble with your ride, Vaughn?" he asked smoothly. Initial look of surprise quickly turning into an eyebrow raise, Griffin took a step back and adjusted his collar.

"Just working the kinks out," Gabriel countered, giving the man a once-over.

Unlike the last time he'd seen Griffin, the agent looked decently put together, with his suit jacket neatly folded over one arm, hair perfectly combed, and crisp white shirt wrinkle free and bloodless. "Taking off?" Gabriel guessed, not bothering to hide his smile.

Griffin glanced at the floor for a moment before shoving his hands in his pockets. "Yeah, I am. Some of us have to get back to their _actual _jobs."

Gabriel ignored the comment, giving a nod instead to Riley's room at the end of the hall. "How is she?"

"Alive," he answered gruffly. "And sleeping, so you better not wake her up."

Gabriel crossed his arms, feeling slightly insulted. "Wasn't planning on it."

In truth, all he actually wanted – no, _needed_ – to do since the moment they'd been separated was see Riley's face. Watch every inhale and exhale. Feel her hand while he held it in both of his.

The rest could wait until later.

Griffin shrugged like it didn't really matter one way or the other. "Yeah, well, I'm out of here. If she does wake up…" He glanced down at the floor again then looked somewhere over Gabriel's head with an unreadable expression. "Just keep it short, and don't upset her." Then without another word, Griffin walked off and disappeared around the corner.

Gabriel blinked, unable to shake the feeling that their whole conversation felt off. Maybe it was the lack of a smirk on his face, or his slightly subdued nature, or maybe the fact that he wasn't surrounded by his usual cloud of smugness, but Gabriel was suddenly struck with the notion that he'd never see Griffin again.

Spinning the chair, he following him around the corner. "Hey," Gabriel called to the retreating form.

Already halfway to the elevators, Griffin stopped, paused, then gave a sigh before slowly turned back. There was the faintest hint of resentment in his otherwise neutral expression. "What?" he called in return.

Gabriel pursed his lips. He hadn't exactly thought this through, but knew in an instant that no matter what came out of his mouth, it was never going to be enough. "I wanted to say…thank you," he said. "I owe you one."

Griffin considered the words for a moment, then made a noise that sounded almost like a laugh as he shook his head in disbelief and continued to walk away. "Yeah, you do," he called over his shoulder. An elevator door chimed its opening and with a final nod in Gabriel's direction, Griffin disappeared.

Gabriel sat alone with the debt he'd never be able to repay and the burning image of a scarred man smiling with lust. He didn't like owing people, but as Gabriel turned the wheelchair around and continued on his trek, he knew it didn't matter for one simple reason.

Riley.

The last glimpse he'd had of her was back on the Charleston, as her prone body had disappeared into a helicopter. That moment was forever seared in his memory, hours later still causing his chest to tighten as he had wondered in a brief, wild instant if that would be the last time he ever saw her alive.

Gabriel's tenuous grip on his sanity had only weakened upon arriving at St. Luke's and discovering that there were no cameras in the OR to chip into. Then they'd intubated him, robbing Gabriel even of his ability to ask if his partner was still breathing. He spent hours like this, chipped into the hospital records while he lay motionless in a bed, watching nurses come in and out. Not one of them knew he'd been screaming at them in his mind, begging for a single word about Riley Neal. Not one of them knew how he furiously swore at their backs as they left. It had been purgatory – no, it had been hell. His fully functioning brain had been a prisoner, locked in a lifeless body. And there was nothing Gabriel could do but slowly go insane.

Finally, it had been a brief operative note entered into the hospital system which had pulled him back from the edge. Turning to liquid from relief, Gabriel had read the post-op diagnosis, the last final line of it, over and over until his vision blurred with tears and he could see each word when he closed his eyes.

_Condition of patient: stable_

They say there are a precious few defining moments in every person's life. Moments that are hinged on choices made, and still others that are borne from trial and tribulation. Wheeling to a stop outside room 507, Gabriel knew reading Riley's post-op note had been one of his.

And now he had to decide what to do about it. After all, Griffin had said not to upset her.

Crossing the threshold, Gabriel pushed that question to the side as his heart skipped a beat and he released the breath he'd been holding.

There she was.

Lying at a raised incline on the bed, Riley was too pale and too still, with too many plastic lines and noisy machines around her. She looked fragile, and it squeezed at Gabriel's heart to know his strong, capable partner was trapped there, weakened and defenceless.

Taking up vigil at her left side, he noted that the bruise-like shadows beneath Riley's closed eyes were nearly as dark as the curling tendrils that framed her face. They lay in stark contrast to the square, bone white bandages that were taped to her cheek and disappearing beneath the neckline of her hospital shirt. Gabriel averted his eyes. He couldn't look at those without wondering about the torn skin they covered. Wondering, as his stomach turned, how they'd come to be.

It was even harder to look at the sling holding Riley's right arm. That shoulder would never recover its full range of motion, and it might ache for years to come. It would certainly take years for the memory of her face, screwed up in unbearable pain as Takayama had shifted the bone, to finally fade from Gabriel's mind.

Though by far the worst of all was what lay beneath the covers, hidden from view. A bullet wound he'd been unable to prevent. A lung injury which had resulted from Riley's focus on his safety instead of the danger right in front of her.

This, along with the rest of her injuries, was his fault. His fault for having the chip. For being – as she had put it – the one who had to live. Riley had made it damn clear enough on the boat that his safety was all she cared about. And that no matter how much he wanted to protect her with everything he had, she wasn't interested.

She would still do her job. She would still die just so he could live.

Gabriel shook his head roughly, trying to rid himself of the dark thoughts that were tightening the cords in his throat. No, he had to stop. He had to remember the most important thing.

She was _alive_, damn it.

Gabriel turned his attention to Riley's left hand resting over the covers. Carefully, trying not to disturb her or the tube running into it, he encased that hand in both of his own. Her cool, slender fingers disappeared beneath his larger, calloused ones and quickly began to heat as he gave Riley his warmth.

"Hey, you," he whispered to her sleeping face.

Maybe it was his imagination, or maybe it was just an unconscious muscle twitch, but Gabriel could have sworn that as he gave a gentle squeeze, for an instant Riley squeezed back. It set off a flutter in his chest all the same.

Christ, he was such a goner.

"…Gabriel…?"

At the sound of the barely heard whisper, Gabriel completely froze up. Heart thrumming and eyes locked on their entwined hands, he wondered just how much his brain was playing tricks on him.

"_Gabriel._"

Nope, not a trick.

Turning his blue eyes to meet green, Gabriel was sure his heart would burst from his chest. "Riley…" he breathed. Bringing her hand to his face, he reveled in the smile forming on her lips. "Yeah, it's me," he answered, pressing his own lips against her knuckles. "I'm here, Riley. I'm right here."

Squeezing his hand, her tired eyes studied him like she was trying to commit every detail to memory. "It's so good to see you," she whispered. He noticed then that her voice was shaking. "I…I didn't know if I'd ever see you again."

"Same," he answered roughly, massaging Riley's fingers with his thumb. "God, you have no idea."

At this confession, her wavering smile fell and Riley looked at him with a heartbroken expression that felt like a punch to his gut.

_Don't upset her_, he chastised himself. _You're an idiot, Vaughn. Don't upset her._

"Gabriel…" Shifting, whatever Riley had been about to say died with a hiss of pain on her lips. Her eyes snapped shut and she completely tensed up, crushing his hand until it hurt.

"Easy, _easy_," Gabriel coaxed, although his own voice rose with anxiety. There was no helping it. She was in pain, and it cut at him like a knife.

After a few tense moments, Riley's iron grip relaxed and her eyes reopened. Her face matched the colour of the bandage on her cheek. "Sorry," she said lamely. "I forgot I can't move that much."

Breathing hard enough that his ribs ached, Gabriel stared at her incredulously. "'Sorry'?" he repeated. "_You're _sorry?! Christ, Riley, _I'm _the one who should be apologizing." Looking down at her hand at his lips, he swallowed thickly before continuing. "I know I don't deserve your forgiveness for what happened, but…I'll do anything to make it right."

Relaxed into the pillow, Riley gave a tired little shake of her head. "I don't – "

"Anything, Riley," Gabriel cut in. "I don't care what it is."

Huffing at what was sure to be his stubbornness, she looked at him for a long moment; green eyes flickering in calculation. Then Riley finally raised one skeptical eyebrow. "Anything?" she confirmed. "You promise?"

Gabriel nodded his agreement. He'd get her the damn moon if she asked.

Riley set her lips in a fine line and gave him a hard stare. "Then what I want is for you to promise you'll never try dying for me again."

Gabriel swore under his breath. Realizing she'd trapped him in a corner, he looked at her pleadingly. "Anything but that."

Riley's eyes narrowed; her face growing dark with anger. "Gabriel…" she warned. "That's all I want. How many times do I have to tell you that it's _your_ life that's _my_ responsibility? Not the other way around."

Even expecting this answer, it still felt like a knife through his heart. "You can say it as many times as you want," Gabriel growled back, holding up an inch of finger space. "It ain't gonna change the fact that I came _this close_ to losing you."

Riley glared back defiantly, but there was that flicker of heartbreak in her eyes again. "And just what makes you think _I'm _the only one whose life was in danger? Did you ever stop to think that maybe, just maybe, _I _came this close to losing _you_?" She pulled her hand from his grasp and gave him the same inch of space with her fingers. Her voice grew angrier as she asked; "Did you even think about how I'd feel?"

The question caught Gabriel off guard. "Riley…I did. Of course I did," he started. "Honestly, I thought you'd be angry as all hell, but I - " Gabriel stopped abruptly, suddenly realizing where he was going with that train of thought, and not wanting to finish. He knew Riley didn't want to hear it.

"What? 'But I' what, Gabriel? 'But I didn't care'? 'But I thought you'd get over it'?" Riley brought her hand up and roughly swiped a stray lock of hair from her eye. "After everything we've been through, how could you think that? How could you think that I don't care about you?"

Tears were beginning to well in her eyes, threatening to rip Gabriel apart. "Riley..." he begged. "Don't..."

"I thought you were dead!" she exclaimed. "When I first woke up after the surgery, I thought you hadn't made it off the ship. I thought I'd lost you forever and it _broke_ me!"

He didn't remember moving. All Gabriel knew was that one moment he had been sitting in the wheel chair and the next he was sitting on the edge of Riley's bed with her crumbling face cradled in his hands.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Riley," he gasped out. "But I love you. I thought that I didn't. I even tried not to. But I love you so damn much it hurts."

For a moment, time seemed to stop as they looked at each other in silence. Then it was impossible to say who moved first. Impossible to say whether Riley pulled him down, or whether Gabriel leaned towards her on his own accord.

Because then their lips met and after that it didn't matter.

Gabriel melted into her, exploring Riley's mouth with a hunger and sorrowful joy that had no words – only feeling. The feeling of Riley's hand clutching his neck, pulling him deeper. Her lips and tongue moving rhythmically against his own. The heat of each rapid exhale against his face.

He didn't want it to end, but as the sound of Riley's menacingly beeping heart monitor became more and more insistent, Gabriel finally ended their kiss, worried that she was overtaxing herself. Pulling away just a few inches, he could still feel their mingling breaths warm the space between them as his own heart beat tried to slow down.

"So just don't ask me that. Please," Gabriel whispered, swiping with his thumb at the single tear that had fell to Riley's cheek. "Don't ask me to not do everything I can to keep you safe. I can't keep that kind of promise. I won't."

Riley considered this for a moment; her face carefully neutral as she brought her hand around from Gabriel's neck and gently caressed the growing stubble down his jaw. "We're never going to agree on this, are we?" she asked softly.

"No," he answered, beginning to grin. "Never."

Riley just shook her head. "God, you're so stubborn," she chastised, giving Gabriel a look that told him their disagreement was far from over. "I guess you're lucky I love you, too."

Laughing, and smiling so widely it hurt, Gabriel had to agree before leaned down to kiss her again. He knew there would be future arguments, and future dangers. Moments that would test him, and moments that would test her. But as Gabriel sank back in to Riley's embrace, he pushed those thoughts from his mind in favour of their kiss - and all the kisses that were to come.

* * *

**THE END**

* * *

A/N: Augh! It's dooone! You guys have no idea how many revisions this chapter went through. It was a monster trying to sort out and wrap up, but there you have it. The big finale. I'd like to thank each and every one of you so very, VERY much for reading, with extra special thanks to kwisteria, citronsandblueteacups, and evincis for all the behind-the-scenes conversations. It's been such a treat writing for you all, and I can't ever thank you all enough for supporting me in this crazy huge project I took on. Your love has been my drug.

Until next time...

xoxoxo Nina


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